The Undiscovered Journey
by IronHound
Summary: 1535: The brutal Spanish conquest over the Inca is near completion. A desperate band of Inca refugees attempt to escape with powerful Golden objects made by their mysterious Guild of Scholars, and are never seen again. Present Day: Lara Croft attempts to sift out the trail of the lost Inca, but soon crashes hard against an evil megalomaniac and his ages-old empire of pure evil.
1. Prologue1 Exodus

****UPDATED July 2013****

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****######### THE UNDISCOVERED JOURNEY #########****  
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**What's up readers!**

**Thanks for checking out ****The Undiscovered Journey!**

**I truly have ****no**** idea how many people are reading this story. I can lose myself in it for a few hours each week, and for me that is enough. Hopefully though, there's one or two of you out there enjoying it**.

**## STORY OUTLINE ##**

**In 1535 the Spanish conquest of the Inca lands in South America is coming to its final and brutal conclusion. Unknown to the world at large, a brotherhood of gifted scholars existed within the ancient city of Cuzco. Fantastical technological achievements were made by this group of learned men and women, achievements that are considered impossible to this very day. As the Spanish close in to complete their dominion, a small group of the scholars escape in a daring midnight dash to the depths of the Amazon Rainforest and are never seen again. Lara Croft finds tantalizing, but scant clues to their existence, leading her on a trail of impossible discovery. However, she isn't the only one on the trail of the escaped Inca Scholars and their Machines of the Gods, and quickly finds herself drawn into a dangerously hard fought battle as she attempts to find the evidence required to unlock the mystery of their disappearance. Old friends are gone, others become caught in a vortex of intrigue, as dark and evil adversaries seek to sift the ancient trail before Lara does and use the ancient technologies for their own dire ends. Lara, and her friends, are tested to their limits as they attempt to stay alive and avert a dire prophecy set in stone years past in the ancient Inca world. **

**## STORY NOTES ##**

_**This will **__**not**__** be a short story. **_**As of June 2013**** I estimate it in the region of 50% done. **

**There's some new characters who've come out of my own twisted mind. So far, the only characters you will recognise from the Tomb Raider world are Lara herself and Winston. I have ideas how to bring in a few others, but they're just a 'maybe' at this stage.**

**New chapters are now coming smoothly. I'm not a perfect writer, and nobody realises this more than me, but that doesn't stop me trying to get there. I know there are issues with the way some parts are written. Over time I hope to revisit and rewrite where necessary. For the moment, the story will be written and I'll see where it goes from there. You can't re-write nothing.**

**##****UPDATES****##**

**17th_NOV_2009 - Chapter 1 - Beginnings - first uploaded.****  
****29th_NOV_2009 - Extended chapter 1 which is now complete. I will still make the odd change to it though to make it read better.****  
****13th_DEC_2009 - Chapter 2 Mk 1 uploaded. Still a bit rough around the edges, but ok as it stands.****  
****17th_JAN_2010 - Chapter III uploaded. At long last...****  
****31st_JAN_2010 - Began a re-write / reword / overview / merciless culling of CHIII. Now 1/2 complete.****  
****23rd_FEB_2010 - CH IV uploaded.****  
****26th_MAR_2010 - CH IV Edited****  
****12th_APR_2010 - Ch V - Veteran's Riposte - uploaded. Part 1.****  
****23rd_MAY_2010 - Chapter V - Veteran's Riposte - uploaded. Part II.****  
****26th_JUNE_2010 - Prologue 1 Uploaded - Exodus.****  
****28th_JUNE_2010 - Edited Prologue 1, more to come with that.****  
****08th_AUGUST_2010 - Chapter 6 - Prey Hunter - Part I uploaded. It took ages? Don't blame me! My dog ate the computer and you don't want to know the rest!****  
****05th_SEPT_2010 - Chapter 6 - Prey Hunter - Part II uploaded. It took ages? Don't blame me! This trenchcoated guy came up behind me in the dead of night, slugged me across the head and stole my computer!****  
****09th_OCTOBER_2010 - Chapter 6 - Prey Hunter - Part III Uploaded. Yup! it took ages, but, see, this black hole made my PC disappear for two whole days!****  
****18th_JANUARY_2011 - Chapter 7 - Affliction of Darkness - Part I uploaded. I know. Trust me, I know. It took ages. No you really don't want to know.****  
****10th_FEBRUARY_2011 - Chapter 8 - Office 43 - uploaded. Heck... You tell **_**me **_**if it's up to scratch!****  
****02nd_APRIL_2011 - Chapter 9 - The Path of Chains - Part I uploaded. So kill me! I took my sweet time loading it up. Come on! This Alsatian came and ate my homework! What was I supposed to do!****  
****05th_APRIL_2011 - Chapter 9 - The Path of Chains - Part II uploaded. Face it! You were expecting another month! Weren't You! IN YOUR FACE!  
****20th_APRIL_2011 - Chapter 9 - The Path of Chains - Part III uploaded. Not quite arriving as predicted, but better late than never! You see... oh nevermind.  
14th_JUNE_2011 - Chapter 10 - Affliction of Darkness - Part II uploaded. Don't say it! Not a single word! Better late than never right... Damn straight!  
10th_JULY_2011 - Chapter 11 - South Pacific Dawn uploaded. Under a month this time! Who says I'm Done and dusted! Huh? Who?  
15th_OCTOBER_2011 - Chapter 12 - The Fallen - uploaded. WAIT! I went on a holiday to the Bahamas and was attacked by pirates! Had to fight my way free I tell you!  
22nd_JANUARY_2012 - Chapter 13 - The Long White Beach uploaded. God even knows how this ever got anywhere near finished.  
17th_JUNE_2012 - Chapter 14 - Nightdevil Pt 1 uploaded - Please try not to notice how long this chapter took to appear!  
08th_OCTOBER_2012 - Chapter 14 Pt II uploaded - Trust me I'm sheepish. I feel truly guilty at leaving you all hanging for so long!  
**06th_JULY_2013 - Chapter 15 - A Shot in the Dark - uploaded. Back from the dead.

******SAT_06th_JULY_2013  
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**You got me. I've been quiet a long time and there's been no updates to Journey.**

**Chapter 15 however, is now up! Better late than never!**

**Cheers Raider Writers!**

**For those reading and following the story - **_**YOU ROCK!**_** Let nobody tell you anything different!**

**- IH -**

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**Please let me know if you like/don't like the story, or the chapter you read. Drop me a message or leave a review. I'd like to hear from you!**

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**Prologue One**

**EXODUS**

**The year 1535**  
**Somewhere within the vast Amazon Basin**

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**The worst** of the squall had passed. The mad thrashing forest canopy had quieted, but the massive age-old boughs still wavered and groaned from the strains of the energetic tempest, sending sporadic dripping curtains tumbling below. The thick water-laden clouds broke apart and a vast field of shimmering stars appeared like jewels against the dark void of space. On the forest floor, every leaf dripped with wet, and tangled masses of vines seemed to weep as they channelled their own excess moisture to the waiting earth below. Life in every form imaginable called out from the darkness, filling the cool night air with an organic symphony of existence.

Braving the night elements, scholar Lloque Capac stood atop an exposed outcrop of huge weathered boulders and counted the number of flaming torches that slowly lumbered by beneath him. They appeared to float through thin air in the near pitch-blackness, momentarily winking out as each became lost amid dense thickets and massive buttressed forest giants. Even on a night such as this, the added light was not ideal, but a necessity to light the way, the little-known path almost completely hidden in shadow as it wound through the massive and ancient rainforest.

Those below, some sixty men, women, and children were all that remained of the free Inca world. The 'children of the sun' had arrived just a few seasons past, marching across the land knowing no boundary, nor giving any quarter. Capac's people had suffered heavy defeat and subjugation as the invaders imposed their rapacious wills upon them, treating the men as slaves and the women as mere playthings. Worse, they had been press-ganged into unwilling armies to fight their own, threatened and murdered if they did not obey. The Inca kings lay dead, also brutally killed by the scheming Sunchildren, whose only desires appeared to be greed and dominion over the Inca lands. They cared little for the Inca people themselves.

And so, a small number had chosen to depart, and flee for their lives.

Capac stared silently through the thinned foliage at the brave souls toiling forward without complaint beneath him. Born in Cusco, he was a tall, distinguished man who never acted without precise thought. His glacier-blue eye's constantly calculated, and his lips beneath the long and flowing white beard often appeared skewed in thought. Eighty star-cycles had come and gone since his birth, the last sixty-five spent as a brilliant student of science. With a warm and encouraging temperament, he was respected by his peers, and admired by a great portion of the general population.

He tugged at the sleeve of his tan coloured full-length robe and cursed silently to himself. The tropical squalls had unexpectedly become more numerous, and intense, putting them nearly three days behind schedule on the journey from their mountain hideout, in which they had been living for the past six moon-phases, to the banks of a mighty un-named river, and the boats that waited for them there. Capac and his followers had not slept in two days and they were exhausted. Just as he was about to call a halt and rest for the night, one of the scouts, trailing some distance behind them, had sent word that the Sunchildren were in sight and bearing down on them with unbending speed.

Now he found himself faced with a difficult quandary and the onerous task of keeping alive as many of the sixty Inca souls as possible. He was also burdened with the responsibility of keeping their cargo out of the hands of the invaders, at any cost. His people were tiring quickly. Most were simple folk, and not able to fight against a malevolent force of Sunchildren. Their number included a mere twenty fighting men, each one resolute, and would fight to the death if it was asked of them, but Capac knew that any resistance on their part would be quashed in minutes, and without a shred of mercy.

"Revered Scholar, the Sunchildren have found us despite our efforts. How much further?"

Capac looked across into the wiry and hardened face of Force Leader Atoc Vicaquiro. The eye's that stared back were hardened malachite-green. The force leader stood lean-muscled and straight like a spear, skin tanned and shoulder-length black hair slightly tangled from days of hard travel.

Capac didn't immediately answer but tuned westward to gaze at the towering formations of heavy grey cloud in the distance, softly illuminated by a full moon. The storms appeared to be moving quickly over the expansive rainforest. "At our current speed of travel Atoc, and without any further rest, I estimate it will be early morning before we reach the falls."

"We don't have that much time." Vicaquiro announced flatly.

"No, my friend. We do not. How long before the Sunchildren are upon us?"

"Hours at most. Five, maybe six if we're lucky. Before dawn we will almost certainly be faced with their steel weapons."

Capac's eyes narrowed, and he rested his chin in the grip an aging hand. "There's a slim chance," he said, deep in thought. "We have one _topo_ between us and a place where the road enters a narrow ravine. Only two men can stand abreast at that point, so it might be possible for us to make a stand there. But –" He let the thought linger.

"Those men chosen to fight will surely die," Vicaquiro finished for him.

Capac sighed with inevitable frustration. "They will. There _is_ no other way. While our best men make a stand, we'll send the cargo onward to the boats with all speed. Gods willing, we can get the boats away before the Sunchildren break through the blockade and make up the distance."

"My men and I will fight to the death, you _will_ reach the river. That I promise you."

Capac gave Vicaquiro a haunted look. "Your daughter, she – "

"If I die, will _you_ become her father Revered Scholar?"

Capac considered for a few moments, a wracking guilt sweeping over him with a deep sense of foreboding. He knew it would be a miracle if Vicaquiro survived; yet without him to lead the blockade, the men would fall quickly to the Sunchildren. "I am already an old man Atoc, but _if_ it comes to that, you have my word. I will protect the girl until my dying days."

Vicaquiro gave a businesslike nod, yet his eyes betrayed emotion at the thought of never seeing his young daughter again. "She – she is a firebrand, headstrong, and will need a firm hand. Don't let her get the better of you Revered Scholar."

Capac regarded him with a thoughtful smile. "It may not come to that Atoc."

"Gods willing," Vicaquiro agreed with false confidence. "I will gather an advance party and move ahead to the ravine. We'll see what defences can be erected before the Sunchildren arrive."

Lloque Capac sighed. He was heartsick to the core of the violence and obliteration the Sunchildren had visited upon the Inca people. Civil war between two would-be-kings, Atahualpa and Huascar, had also drained their civilisation of life, goodwill, and resources. Now both kings were no more, and the people of the land stood harried by an insatiable army, who fed off their wealth and prosperity like leeches and parasites. He was embittered to be sending _any_ more Inca souls to their deaths, but he knew every last man, woman, and child in their party would surely die if he did not.

Finally he placed a hand on Vicaquiro's shoulder. "So be it then Atoc. I'll encourage as much speed from the party as I can in the meantime. When the last of us is through, see what you can do about blocking the path behind us. Gods protect you."

They shook with hands gripped forearm to forearm in a soldiers embrace, and a sense of inevitability hung in the air.

"The Gods protect you too Revered Scholar," Vicaquiro returned in farewell. Then he was gone.

Capac remained atop the high rock outcrop awhile until the last torch had passed by. Carefully, he then descended the rounded boulders until he reached the narrow paved road, taking care to find solid footholds in the darkness. At no more than three paces wide, the road had been designed for foot traffic and Llama only. The fact it existed at all was due to the mistrust the Guild of Scholars had held for the Sunchildren. From the moment their ships appeared over the horizon of the northern coastline, the guild had been wary, viewing their armour, weapons, and aggression with extreme suspicion.

The Guild of Scholars held secrets. Technology, developed over the ages that would be disastrous in the hands of such evil men. Gifted scholars, some with pure blind luck, had made discoveries of truly mystical proportions. Others had taken years of experimentation and constant refinement, to eventually build objects that held powers only the Gods had known until now. The question had been raised, more than once in guild discussions, of weather mankind should even wield such technology.

At the first sign of trouble, the Guildmasters had concocted plans for spiriting the more powerful pieces away from Cuzco, and into the vast rainforest basin to the northeast. Caught short of time by the malevolent speed at which the Sunchildren had taken control however, the guild had needed to alter their plans, their repository in the rainforest being only partially completed. And so they had designed and built ships, at a point where a vast and distant river led away from their troubled land. Those aboard would need to find a safe place to keep the Inca artefacts, and then make sure they remained well hidden from those who might seek to profit or abuse.

Time was of the essence, and Capac hurriedly moved to the last person on the road, a heavyset man leading a llama, packed to the hilt with wrapped objects and other indescribable items that glinted under the filtered moonlight. Quick words were exchanged and the tired farmer encouraged his animal to move more quickly. The llama appeared too tired to argue. Capac's hand went to the man's shoulder in a show of solidarity, and then he moved on.

Within twenty minutes Capac had arrived at the head of the procession and the faster moving travellers, some riding atop saddled llama, and others simply marching with backpacks bursting at the seams. Their eyes widened as he warned of the threat at their backs, and although each walked with leaden steps, they quickened their pace, knowing full well the results if the Sunchildren caught them.

Capac gave an involuntary shudder at the thought of being impaled by one of the metal swords the Sunchildren carried. His eyes flicked with worry to where Vicaquiro's daughter sat saddled in stoic silence atop an overtired llama. The girl had only seen nine turns of the heavens, yet she controlled the animal with expert ease, and encouraged it forward without a single harsh word. Her long and jet-black hair, as well as her intelligent eyes, left no doubt as to her parentage.

"He's getting tired Illpay!" Capac called out to her, nodding toward the grumpy llama. "Can you keep him going a while longer?"

The young girl turned to regard him as he stood beside the road. "He's very tired Revered Scholar," she called back, reaching forward to stroke the animal's long woolly neck. "But he's a good llama, the best one! So he'll keep going, I know he will!"

Capac took up a position beside her and easily matched the llamas quickened pace, seeming to defy the laws of an aging human body.

"The best one!" he said looking up at her with a smile. "I think you might have the right of it there child." He paused a moment and his face became solemn. "Illpay," he addressed her then.

"Yes," the child replied, still patting and stroking the llama.

"I want you to have something."

"What is it?" she asked, turning to face him curiously.

Capac reached into the folds of his robe and produced a small golden dagger that gleamed in the soft moonlight, it's golden blade no longer than the length of a hand. A dark mystical metal also entwined though the dagger like dendritic drainage, and seemed to connect gemstones of the purest blue at odd intervals over the weapon. "Something to keep you safe precious child. But be warned," he looked at her with pointed expression, "I'm only giving it to you because I know you are a smart girl, and won't do the wrong thing. You have to promise me you will look after it, and only use it if you have to."

"You mean if the bad men catch me for a slave?"

Unbidden emotion swept across Capac's weathered features as he looked into the face of the young girl, but he necessarily quashed it to keep up a confident façade. "Yes Illpay," he replied after a moment. "If they catch you, hold it into the sun a few moments, and then –" he couldn't bring himself to finish.

"Stab them," Illpay finished for him, without a hint of fear.

"Yes child," Capac almost whispered. "Exactly that. But only if there is nothing else you can do." He handed her the ornate dagger grip first.

Illpay reached to take it reverently. Her almost-glowing green eyes did not see the wealth in the gift, but rather saw it as a sign of their grave situation, and Capac's heartfelt worry for her wellbeing. She studied it a moment, turning it over so that she could see both sides. "It's beautiful," she said then, still studying every feature.

"And dangerous," Capac added. "The black metal around the edge of the golden blade, do you see it?"

"Yes."

"It's extremely sharp girl, and will cut you badly if you touch it."

"I won't touch it," Illpay assured him with a quick glance into his lecturing gaze.

Capac then produced a small leather sheath. "Here," he said, offering it to her. "Something to keep it in safely. Put it away now with your things, and keep it as our secret, tell no one you have it. Can you do that?"

"I will Scholar Capac," Illpay promised him. She then slid the dagger home inside its protective sheath, and stowed it deeply within a woven-canvas bag hanging beside her.

"That's good little one," Capac said with a nod and conspirative smile. "Now I must go and check on the others. Just as soon as we reach the boats and are away, we'll be able to rest. Keep your llama going as best you can until then." He turned to leave and move further down the line, but as he turned, the child asked one further question.

"Scholar Capac?"

"Yes child, what is it?"

"The bad men are going to catch us aren't they?" Her face held an almost-sure answer to her own question.

"Listen to me child," Capac then replied with age-old conviction. "Nothing is certain. Your destiny is your own. Those bad men will need to work hard to get us, and _if_ they do, old Lloque has a few surprises for them. Now be on your way, and remember what I told you about the dagger."

Illpay nodded, assuring him she would, then encouraged her llama to again quicken it's tired steps.

Capac watched her until she became swallowed in the thick jungle darkness, and the following group arrived with a spluttering torch and bone-tired steps. They laboured under heavy loaded backpacks, and Capac encouraged them as best he could. Once again he turned to view the darkness the girl had disappeared into, and worry speared through him. He did have some tricks up his sleeve if they became pressed, but all required sunlight to operate. There was nothing he could do in the dead of night, and dawn was still many long, tired hours away.

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**T**he treetops spoke with quiet warning as an all-seeing wind blew amongst the quivering leaves in the thriving canopy above. The rainforest lay silently whispering, the shadows shimmering like ghosts as a werewolf moon cast the barest patches of dancing light amid the foliage. Insects dared not speak, and stranger-still forest dwellers chose the sanctity of their burrows over venturing out on such a night of dire threat.

Vicaquiro peered intently over a hastily constructed breastwork of large rocks and fallen branches. He and his men had worked quickly to build the fortification, having scouted the area in small teams for any building materials they could find, and then lug back to the road to add to the semi-ordered structure. Each man had aching limbs and grazed hands from their labour, but the hard work had paid off. They now stood behind a reasonably solid, shoulder-high defensive wall from which they could stage their blockade, and hopefully halt the advance of the Sunchildren.

The silent forest had all sixteen men on edge. It had quieted some minutes past, and now seemed deafening compared to the chaotic, lively din they had all become accustomed to since entering the rainforest basin. Vicaquiro grimly read the signs, something was out there, and he felt the approaching presence with every living fibre in his body. He knew they were no match for the Sunchildren, their weapons and armour vastly inferior, but Gods be damned if he was going to let them past without a fight.

Scholar Capac had arrived following the last of their party no more than two hours ago. All were bone weary and tired from days of little sleep and constant travel; some limped with badly bruised feet, still others swayed in their llama saddles with fatigue, but each had come past with gritted teeth and a set determination to escape and live for better days. Even Vicaquiro's own daughter had seemed determinedly confident, which made him glow with pride as the young girl had ridden past on her grumpy and complaining llama. He could only hope that he and his men could hold off the Sunchildren long enough to give their fleeing countrymen and loved ones a chance.

Worrying, was the fact the Sunchildren had found them at all. Every plan made, every step produced, and every stolen glance, Vicaquiro knew, had been done with the utmost secrecy since hatching their plan to leave Cuzco in the dead of night almost a year ago to this very day. How was it possible, he cursed, that the Sunchildren were upon them after all they had done to conceal their movements?

Something did not sit right in Vicaquiro's mind, and it left a gnawing feeling of uneasiness in the pit of his stomach. The Sunchildren seemed to know their every move, despite plans being made in secret, and preparations carried out amid the shadows in the dead of night. He gave a silent shudder. Perhaps the Sunchildren really were under the protection of the Sun God after all.

Vicaquiro felt guilty, and deathly afraid for those they had left behind in their mountain hideout. No way existed to know if the Sunchildren had rooted them out, and pressed them into slavery. He could only hope his countrymen had made good their escape further into the mountains as planned.

Suddenly, multiple flaming torches appeared in the darkness along the road ahead, appearing like fired devil-eyes dancing in the air. Muffled metallic clanking began to reverberate off the steep ravine walls, as well as the thunking of many metal-armour boots on the stone roadway pavers. Moments later, the alien tongue of the Sunchildren drifted past their ears on spirited eddies of moist jungle air, leaving the Inca men in no doubt their enemy had arrived.

Before long, their view over the defensive wall became a long line of flickering flames, the devil-eyes quickly growing into a crowd of underworld beasts, come to claim their spirits for an eternity of enslavement. Each Inca soldier listened wide-eyed as the lead group of Sunchildren halted at the base of the wall on the other side, their eyes held fear, but each man was steadfast.

Vicaquiro held his hand steady, in a signal for his men to wait. More Sunchildren filled the narrow ravine-confined roadway before them, two abreast only as Scholar Capac had known. The lead enemy began to climb the wall with contempt, their arrogant confidence plainly evident in their energetic stride and ebullient spoken alien words. Vicaquiro could wait no longer; it was now or never. He yelled his best warcry, sounding like a vengeance–bent spirit of the forest, and whipped his hand down in a signal to his men.

War erupted.

Two Incan soldiers let fly with copper-tipped arrows, plucking additional ammunition from piles of sand stuck like pincushions with extras. Others took up slings and hurled fist-sized rock missiles over the wall, hoping to crack skulls or seriously bruise the invaders with a rain of stone. Two men worked together, and simply hurled a collection of far larger rocks over the wall, aiming to barrage and batter the enemy away from the precipice. The remaining Inca men stood with clubs, spears, and one pilfered Sunchild blade of steel. Vicaquiro was the only man to hold any blade of note; a larger twin to the dagger Capac had given his daughter, though he did not yet know it. The golden blade with inlaid gemstones had been a gift from the master craftsmen at the Guild of Scholars, and was a full sized, somewhat heavy sword. The mysterious black metal swirled and snaked through the blade and seemed at times to take on a life of it's own. But Vicaquiro had no time to ponder its mysteries.

Alien yells split the night as the Sunchildren realised they were under attack. Anger and indignation spilled from their mouths as they became battered by the assault sent forth by the native Inca men, and attempted in vain to jostle away from the flying projectiles.

Anger pushed the Sunchildren into frenzy. Pride did not allow them to be bested by a simple band of natives. The first rows of invaders fell back with dented armour, dented pride, and streams of blood wetting the stone at their feet. Those behind rushed onward however, and sheer force of numbers, as well as speed of attack, soon overwhelmed the projectile attack the Inca men sent forth.

An armoured enemy appeared atop of the defensive wall, bellowing pure rage, but Vicaquiro silenced him with a powerful thrust of his golden blade. The Devil fell back into the night with a fountain of blood that shot forth to cover his comrades. Vicaquiro knew with certainty their time was limited. Such rage and passion for death could not be denied forever, and would soon push them back under an overwhelming tide of aggression.

Two more Sunchildren appeared, Vicaquiro swung and cut the sword arm of one man cleanly from his body. The other was barraged backward by a large rock hurled forth by the two Inca men working together. The Sunchildren were relentless however, and two more quickly replaced them, their yells of war cutting the night like howling underworld beasts. Vicaquiro again dealt a mighty blow to one, and the other was stuck by the spearman, both fell back with cries of rage and the gurgle of death.

Vicaquiro and his men fought with unyielding passion, successfully defending their position in this way for some time. Exactly how long however, no man could be sure. They repelled wave after wave of crazed and yelling Sunchildren, but soon the brave defenders began to tire, and their already-laboured efforts began to slow and come amid deeply inhaled breaths of fatigue. Vicaquiro urged them on, igniting vehemence for their enemy, and devotion for their loved ones. But just when it seemed they would prove a major obstacle for the advancing enemy, the state of play changed.

Flaming torches fizzed over the breastwork amid a sweeping tide of armoured men. Suddenly they were fighting and to hand and sword to sword with the steel shelled Sunchildren, fending off cutting blows and bringing woefully inadequate weapons to bear in retaliation. Vicaquiro cursed, another brutal battering for the good men at his side.

Flaming yellow light bathed the area from the fallen torches, truly making the scene appear straight from the underworld. The two brave rock-hurlers slumped to the ground, run through by slick steel blades. Vicaquiro lashed out at the growing enemy numbers in their midst with great flowing arcs and cuts of rabid force. The golden blade cleaved armour like butter and limbs parted from enemy bodies with gouts of flowing blood and screams of pain. But the tide had turned, and Vicaquiro knew they had done all that was humanly possible.

With a yell he ordered retreat, but only six men responded, the others too badly injured, or dead.

The Inca men turned and ran for the forest, Vicaquiro making sure he was the last to leave. Fending off the thrusts from two determined men, he bolted for the open road ahead, and the dark shadows there that would hide him.

Sancha, a brave veteran, limped ahead of him, his right calf muscle slashed and dripping with blood. Vicaquiro knew with anguish the man was dead. He rushed up to Sancha and gripped his shoulder. They shared a brief and silent look of loss and farewell, no words could be shaped from the bitterness each man felt. Sancha then pushed him away and Vicaquiro rushed onward as quickly as his tired legs would carry him. A scream of tormented suffering soon echoed from behind, and he knew without a shred of doubt that Sancha was gone.

He looked up at the darkened forest canopy that now filled every space overhead, hoping he might find a hint of the approaching dawn. At a little over one topo (approximately 5 miles) away, the unnamed falls in the mighty river, and Capac's sailing craft waiting there, seemed a desperate bit for freedom at best. But he knew he had to try, for his daughter's sake if nothing else. He sheathed his golden blade and bent forward in a runner's stance. Face toward the barely perceptible Inca roadway opening out before him in the still-dripping gloom, he began a hard-pressed loping rhythm toward his salvation.

Vicaquiro was in no condition to run a marathon. After the first half hour, his lungs felt as if they would burst with each laboured breath he sucked in. After an hour, his muscles protested with aches he didn't believe possible. And then finally, the growing dark tendrils of fatigue began to dull the pain. He began a series of rest stops to resupply his indebted bloodstream with oxygen, and to take the strain off his tight and protesting legs. As time wore on, the stops became more frequent, his reserves of energy becoming sapped to dangerously low levels. Of his pitifully few remaining defenders, he saw nothing.

There was never any question of stopping and letting the Sunchildren catch him for the sure and easy release of death. The vision of Ilpay in the hands of the malignant invaders was more than enough to drive his pumping legs and fuel his flight onward.

The secret hollows of the endless rainforest were beginning to lose their obscurity, and the dark authority of the night was beginning to lift, when Vicaquiro crested a ridge and spied the quicksilver majesty of a mighty river curving with serenity toward the distant horizon. The distant rumble borne of vast volumes of spilling water as it tumbled from a great height and crashed into deep pools below could also be heard radiating across the landscape. Vicaquiro doggedly progressed toward the sound, hoping to the Gods above that Capac and the others were ready to leave.

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**F**our Inca-built vessels, the likes of which had never been seen before by any human eyes, rested in the shallows of a large pool at the base of the thundering waterfall. At 50 feet (15.24 meters) the boats were a bold display of ingenious design and intelligent use of available materials. Reed bundles, tied and turned up at both ends, underpinned each vessel. However, intermixed with the reed bundles, was a balsawood framework to give added strength. Atop the reed and balsa hulls, sat a superstructure of balsa decking, railings, and cabins. Each vessel also had large square-rigged cotton sails, which sagged lifelessly in the draftless dawn.

Lloque Capac rushed along the riverbank shouting directions to his countrymen, labouring with tired steps and straining limbs to stow away their belongings and the mysterious objects from the Guild of Scholars. A large pile still remained on the riverbank awaiting a space on the boats, and Capac's sense of urgency was rising by the minute. For all he knew, Vicaquiro and his men could have been overrun within minutes, leaving the Sunchildren perilously close by.

"Illpay!" he called across to Vicaquiro's daughter, labouring under the weight of a grain sack as she hefted it across the gangplank of one vessel.

"Yes Scholar Capac," she returned, her voice gritted with the weight of her labour. "What is it?"

"When you're finished with that," he pointed toward the sack on her shoulder, "I need you to take a special bundle to the top of that boat." Then he pointed with his other outstretched arm and pointed finger. "See it there," he directed, "leaning against that tree?"

Illpay nodded. "I see it," she replied. "I'll get it next."

"Good! Thankyou girl!" Capac encouraged. "I'd be lost without my best helper!" He smiled at her as carefree as he could muster, and then rushed further along the bank to oversee the loading of other mysterious cargo aboard the boat ahead.

Golden metal gleamed beneath the tight wrappings of cotton sheets and woven coverings. Other objects seemed alive, a strange black metal seeming to writhe and pulse with intuition all of its own, and fashioned into inexplicable shapes that also poked forth from between protective folds of linen. Capac worked feverishly, retying loosened ropes, re-wrapping undone coverings, resetting jumbled pieces of complex objects, and quieting still other bundles that hummed strangely when disturbed incorrectly.

Capac gave specific directions for the manhandling of certain bundles, yet seemed nonplussed by the stowing of others, caring only that they were not left on the riverbank. Certain items he directed should go in the lead vessel, his hope being they could get the vessel underway as soon as possible and away from the imminent danger.

The stars in the sky overhead were beginning to fade and blink out when a tired shout rang out from the shaded forest surrounding the river. Moments later, the desperately tired and battle-worn figure of Atoc Vicaquiro emerged from the lightening mire, half running, half stumbling, but alive. Upon seeing Capac, arms filled with tightly bound bundles, Vicaquiro rushed toward him.

"Scholar Capac!" he shouted urgently. "Please tell me you are ready to leave!"

"Atoc!" Capac returned with genuine surprise, and friendly warmth. "I had begun to fear the worst for you! Getting here took longer than I'd hoped; everybody is dead on their feet. Another hour though, I hope, should see us away."

Vicaquiro looked stricken. "I don't know if we have that long," he implored through recuperative breaths. "We delayed the Sunchildren for a while, but not as long as I'd hoped. We did all we could, but they simply barraged their way through us with their superior numbers and endless rage. I've never seen men as overcome with the spirit of domination as those we fought back there." He pointed his thumb over his shoulder to indicate the path from which he had come, and then he fixed Capac with a pointed stare. "An hour will cut it extremely close Scholar Capac, the sooner we leave, the better."

Capac nodded, his head held back to clear the wrapped objects in his arms. "Then we must throw caution to the wind. It is now our only hope. Dump the remaining objects anywhere you can find a space aboard the boats. Speed is now all that matters. We cannot be left caught on the riverbank when the Sunchildren arrive." He then fixed Vicaquiro with an imploring stare. "Can you oversee the loading of the last boat in line near the falls? If the Sunchildren arrive, it will bear the brunt of their attacks."

Vicaquiro nodded in affirmation. "I will see it loaded, have no fear." Then he turned to rush toward the vessel.

"Atoc?" Capac called after him.

Vicaquiro simply halted and looked back toward him.

"The others?" Capac asked, referring to the other men who'd manned the barricade in the ravine.

"Most are dead," Vicaquiro informed solemnly. "Some escaped with me, maybe three men at best. I saw none along the road though. My best guess is they hid in the forest, or they are following me up on the road. We were hit hard. I truly have no idea if they will make it here."

Capac nodded again, as if affirming his own worst fears. "The Gods rest their spirits. But we cannot wait for those who may still be alive." The words were bitter, and harried him as he turned and resumed hauling his load onto the waiting wooden vessel.

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**T**he ripples on the surface of the sedately moving, tannin stained river reflected a lightening sky that began to blaze with a brilliant blue in the strengthening morning light. The tempest storms of the previous night hovered on the horizon, and seemed to soak up the mists rising from the depths of the rainforest basin, adding to their already dark and overloaded mass.

Capac and Vicaquiro watched, each with stained urgency, as paddlers onboard the lead vessel dipped their blades into the water and propelled the craft into the middle of the river, and away from the riverbank. An hour had passed, time seemed to vanish, and the strain of the coming peril began to show across the features of each man.

Without bothering for needless words, both men ran to the next vessel in line, and Vicaquiro roughly manhandled the gangplank aboard. Capac, well past tired, and his vintage age beginning to slow him considerably, scooped up the last few remaining sacks on the riverbank beside the vessel, and hurled them aboard. Tired men, battling to stay awake, took their positions along each side of the vessel with carved wooden paddles in their hands.

A burly farmer, with skinned hands from some accident or other, took up a long pole for himself along with Capac and Vicaquiro. The three men, each with their own pole, strained to shove the Inca craft away from the riverbank and into the current running mid-stream. The paddlers began to help once they had clear water in which to dip their paddles.

With the second craft away, Capac began to sway on his feet.

"Easy old friend." Vicaquiro soothed, as he reached to grip the elder man's tired arm. "Your ride is coming up. We need you alive to steer it, and the fleet for that matter, to wherever it is you had in mind."

Capac cursed amid the haze of fatigue, he was not the young man he once had been. "No time to lose," he said with a set expression and determined gaze. "Get me aboard my vessel, and let's be rid of this plagued land."

Vicaquiro and the burly farmer threw down their poles and each aided Capac to the gangplank of the third balsawood and reed craft, and saw him safely onto the wooden decking. Two paddlers then took in the gangplank and threw it aside on the deck; it could be stowed properly later. Vicaquiro and the farmer then took up the large wooden poles waiting on the bank at their feet, and shoved at Capac's vessel with all their strength.

Suddenly a shout erupted, and all eyes turned to see a bloodied Inca soldier stumble from the forest and crumple down to his knees at the end of the paved road.

"The Sunchildren!" The man shouted with a broken voice, filled with his impassioned plea. "They are here! Away with you! Away with you now!"

In the immediate silence after the soldiers warning, every Inca man, woman, and child on the last two vessels could indeed hear the devastating march of an army emanate from within the gloomy and steaming confines of the jungle.

With a last mighty heave on the wooden pole, Vicaquiro set Capac's vessel free within the living river. He shared a last look of farewell with the old scholar.

"Fare you well old friend," he called out across the growing expanse of water. "I'll see you up the river. Look after my daughter until I catch you up, won't you."

"I will Atoc," Capac called back with emotion cracking his voice. "Trust in the Gods, I will see her safe. Now get to your craft," he pointed toward it with growing trepidation, "and get under way!"

Capac again lamented his tired and creaking frame. After watching Vicaquiro bolt for the last vessel, still stuck against the riverbank, he hustled as quickly as possible to the upper of three decks. Once there, he spied the item he'd asked Illpay to bring up and leave for him.

His horrors compounded when the shouts and yells of a triumphant enemy rose to a crescendo from the murmurs of the living forest. Beset with growing panic, and with tired shaking hands, Capac stole a glance over the wooden railing of the upper deck, and spied a scene he'd hoped with a passion not to see.

Vicaquiro swung his golden blade in life-and-death combat with the first of the relentless Sunchildren to arrive. The burly farmer's muscles bulged and threatened to pop as he strained with incredible might, attempting to push the last vessel free of the riverbank. It inched slowly, and Capac willed the Gods to smile on them one last time.

Capac turned his attention to the bundle, wilfully forcing the rising panic from his harried thoughts. Shivering fingers worked at the knotted cords and linen wrappings around the object, amid Capac's own frustrated curses. Soon however, a long and slim golden object appeared from its protective folds.

Capac worked quickly and methodically, driven by the perilous situation before him. Black metal parts attached to a long golden tube, itself having swirlings of the embedded black metal all along its length. A polished wooden stock was next to be clicked into place, as well as several other unexplainable mechanical metal pieces, all made of the mysterious black metal. Two large, rectangular, and thin metal plates were also snapped in place on the device. Deep-blue gemstones were arranged over the plates at regular intervals, and seemed to catch the early morning sunlight as it strengthened with the approaching day.

What formed in his aged and scholarly hands, was a weapon, something he once swore passionately his knowledge and learning would never be forced to produce. As the Sunchildren had overran his people with furious contempt, clapped them in chains, and set them working as slaves however, Capac had seen the terrible future that awaited his people, and turned his hands to weapon making. He would never forgive himself, the thought of killing snaked through him like a sickening nausea, and he knew he would be forever changed from this day forward.

Standing tall then on the upper deck, he ordered his paddlers to hold position against the gently flowing current, so as not to increase the distance any further between them and the vessel behind. He reached into a pocket and produced a massive blue gemstone, around the size of a 20th century tennis ball, and secured it within the weapon's gold and black-metal breech. He adjusted the black metal plates with inlaid gemstones toward the treeline where the sun was about to poke through, and immediately the gemstones appeared to catch fire and glow with power, setting off a resonating hum throughout the entire device. But still there was not enough sunlight to operate the weapon, the 'suncannon', as he'd come to think of it. He waited, and stilled himself for he knew he must do.

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**W**hat in the God's name was Scholar Capac doing? Vicaquiro thought to himself as he danced aside to avoid a flurry of slashes unleashed by a crazed Sunchild. Capac's boat was marking time in the middle of the river, instead of escaping, as the crazy old man _ought_ to be doing. A swarm of Sunchildren now surrounded him, and he knew with clinical certainty he could not fend them off much longer. He stole a lightening glance toward his own vessel.

With a feat of great strength, the burly farmer, whose name turned out to be Evitrea, had successfully pushed the last remaining craft free of the riverbank, and was now standing on its lower deck, using the pole to fend off Sunchildren as they attempted to board the vessel from the water.

Vicaquiro swung wildly, the golden blade thrumming through the air with each mighty swing, but he was desperately tired, and knew he must get free of the anarchic knot of enemy around him before he faded completely. Slowly he stepped toward the riverbank, his corded arms and heaving chest approaching breaking point as he neared the water's edge. It would take a minor miracle, he thought, if he was ever going to win free of the war-crazed Sunchildren. He needed a plan, and a Gods blessed good one.

Suddenly, yells of panic and fear shrieked out from the river, and Vicaquiro stole yet another glance over his shoulder to establish what had gone amiss.

Flames danced over the upper deck of his wooden craft with speedy ruin and smoking destruction. Evitrea now battled man-to-man with two muscled enemy. Blood stained his gallant chest, but still the brave farmer threw the enemy from the decks like mere sacks of grain. Half of the quick-thinking paddlers abandoned their labour, leaving the other half to propel the craft, and rushed at the flames with heavy linen sacks filled with water. Vicaquiro vented silent frustrated rage.

Seeking out the source of the flames, he searched the immediate area in the midst of his defending parries and the barraging attempts of those in close battle quarters attempting to knock him down. He soon saw that men with brightly coloured armour had stationed themselves aside from the battle, clearly leaders, or chieftains of some sort, judging by their superior battle garb and the hovering bodyguards close at hand. Burly men rushed forward from the group with a type of vigorously flaming bombs, and hurled them out across the water at the hapless vessel. Vicaquiro cursed once more with seething anger. Sorely beset, there was nothing he could do to quash the attack, and a growing sense of defeat began to build inside him as yet more men gathered to hurl the flames. He knew the reed and balsawood craft would quickly burn to the waterline if the flaming attacks were not halted within the next few moments.

Suddenly, as if answering Vicaquiro's prayers, the air fired with an intense shrieking, sounding as if a heavenly warhost had descended from the skies in a battle rage to take up the fight. Searing white light shot forth from the upper decks of Scholar Capac's vessel, still marking time further downstream in the middle of the river, and smashed into the ground with a crackling energy to leave a small crater and send dirt flying like a hailstorm of heavenly wrath.

Sunchildren flew airborne from the smouldering impact points engulfed in white flames and screaming through tortured lungs for mercy. Even away at middle distance, Vicaquiro could clearly see the elderly scholar standing atop his vessel, holding some sort of device that glinted gold and glowed blue under the first rays of the rising sun, it appeared to be a perplexing weapon of some sort. Without needing to be told the old man's intentions, he used the momentary chaos to make good his escape and take a running leap into the less-than-inviting brown waters of the river, sheathing his sword mid-air as he went.

Immediately the knot of invaders behind him disappeared within more crackling white light. They became thrown against trees, pounded into the ground, or were themselves picked up and pitched into the river, burning furiously within mystical flames of the purest white.

Vicaquiro hit the water and stroked madly away from the calamitous riverbank, and the unearthly energy that plagued his enemies there. He reached the now heavily burning boat, not yet having reached the middle of the river, and clambered aboard over the side railings, before turning back to survey the carnage he'd just escaped. Bolt after bolt continued to shriek from the old scholars hands, tearing at and burning the Sunchildren where they stood, or throwing their ragdoll bodies though the air with vehement force.

But almost as quickly as Scholar Capac had wrested the tide of the battle from the hands of the Sunchildren, a darkened mass of stormcloud drifted across the face of the sun's rising disc, and smothered the brilliant light like a shuttered lantern. Shadow draped like a heavy blanket across the stricken wooden vessel on which Vicaquiro stood, and the scene of battle surrounding it, now mired with death and thick acrid smoke. Capac's energy bolts fell ominously silent, and Vicaquiro knew the sun's departure heralded yet another turn in fortunes for the Sunchildren.

The heat of the rushing flames flashed the doomed vessel's tightly bound reed bundles into ignition, causing the flames to spread ruinously into the main balsawood structure of the unique craft, and set its wooden backbone alight. Vicaquiro knew with certainty it was lost, and once again tasted the bitterness of defeat as he watched his command begin to burn with hot fury. Images bled through his mind, of the plundering enemy hoisting the stowed treasures high, as trophies of war, and his mood darkened beyond charcoal black with the thought. He yelled for those aboard to abandon ship, and swim for all they were worth toward Capac's slowly retreating vessel. It was a plan of perilously thin odds, but it was the only option any of them had.

Through the flames and billowing smoke he found Evitrea helping a mother and child into the water, pointing them downriver with an outstretched arm, and handing them a section of balsa planking for floatation once they were both immersed. The barrel-chested farmer saw him arrive, and his face became set in a grim expression as he stood in greeting.

"We are lost Force Leader Vicaquiro," he lamented with resigned sadness. "There is no hope for these people," he nodded toward the mother and child in the water, "they will never make it."

"If there is even the slimmest hope my friend," Vicaquiro stated solemnly. "We must attempt to give them even that." He paused a moment, then gripped the solid man by the shoulder, his lamenting features speaking volumes. "We must tear this boat apart to keep it from the hands of the Sunchildren. Can you help me do this?"

Evitrea nodded in a last act of defiance, then bent down to take up a dropped enemy blade. "I'll cut the remaining fastenings with this," he said with conviction. "But I'll do it alone. You get yourself after the good scholar's vessel, and try helping some of our countrymen along the way."

"You'll never make it if I leave you here alone."

"The time has come for me to join with my family in the heavens," Evitrea replied with staunch emotion. "I wish to die here in the land where I left them, and so this will be my final act. Farewell brother, I wish you a long and prosperous life." With that, he gripped Vicaquiro's arms in a vicelike grip that allowed no argument, and pitched him into the river as if he were a mere featherweight.

Vicaquiro surfaced to the sounds of Evitrea's borrowed blade hacking and slashing from somewhere inside the gouts of smoke billowing from the dying Inca sailing craft. He took one last sorrowful look at the dignified vessel, then with several powerful strokes, he swam into the main current in the middle of the river, hoping to the Gods the resident fish disliked human flesh, and allowed the faster flowing water there to carry him along. He could do little else, his energy reserves dangerously spent from the rigours of battles fought, and his hours-long flight through the forest to reach the river earlier.

He looked up and scanned the flowing expanse of water ahead for the cunning and mysterious old scholar's craft. Spying it, Vicaquiro noted that Capac had allowed his command to drift a little further upstream, moving it still further away from the centre of danger, but had again begun to back water as soon as he'd seen the last craft abandoned. Crewmen readied ropes, and shouted to their countrymen in the water, clearly hoping to rescue them from the clutches of the almighty river.

Suddenly, several large objects splashed down into the water around Vicaquiro with deep, depth-charge sounding notes of disturbance, leaving angry foaming bubbles welling to the surface to mark their passage. Several people who'd escaped the burning craft along with him screamed and gurgled as the objects scored direct hits; others simply vanished beneath the surface with hardly a sound. Vicaquiro grimaced ruefully as his burning malachite eyes surveyed the carnage, yet more casualties to add to the thousands already killed.

Ducking beneath the surface in a dive to avoid the danger, he compelled himself through the water with muscles protesting, and drew upon energy reserves he never knew existed. Trees had now begun to overhang the banks of the river, and Vicaquiro swam beneath the surface until his breath gave out, surfacing only a small distance from the low-slung branches reaching out over the water. He paddled beneath them until he reached the muddy bank, then slowly clambered from the water and hid amongst a thicket of tall grass-like leaves.

Crouching down amid the shadows, Vicaquiro held his breath as a small band of Sunchildren hurried past carrying the long poles the Inca had used to shove their boats away from the riverbank. The poles had been fashioned into large slings by having lengths of material tied to the ends of each one, allowing heavy rocks to be hurled into the middle of the river with devastating effect. He was just about to surge from his hiding place in a desperate attempt to thwart this new threat when another invader ran past, yelling angrily at those again setting up to hurl rocks into the river and deliver death.

A scuffle broke out within the group, the newcomer seeming to level threats at the ones wanting to kill the people in the river. The newcomer shouted, pointing at the helpless Inca at the mercy of the river current, then shoved a thickly bearded man, causing him to stagger backward. Swords were drawn, and a deathly battle ensued between the foreigners. The newcomer cut down three men with ruthless efficiency, and then bent down to hack at the pole slings with disgust.

Vicaquiro remained rooted to the spot, comprehension dawning. The newcomer, for reasons he could not fathom, was not allowing the people in the river to be killed in such a fashion, if at all. It was a perplexing move. Why was this enemy helping them, he pondered, and why was he prepared to kill his own to uphold his convictions? It made little sense, considering all he'd seen of the Sunchildren so far.

The three brightly coloured leaders suddenly appeared, and rushed up to the strangely acting man with angry shouts, drawn swords, and clear frustration. A man in armour as black as the night seemed the angriest, and shoved the sling destroyer powerfully, sending him staggering back into the waiting arms of the two other chieftains. The man in black then shouted with ferocity, pointing at the now restrained man with pure and evil anger. Then, within the blink of an eyelid, the man in black's sword had run through the chest of the strange one. The two holding him down released their grip with looks of surprise, and stood glued to the spot as he stumbled backward with a glassed-over pale expression, and overbalanced into the dark waters of the river with a wet splash.

At that moment, a large swarm of enemy rushed by him, each man carrying a strangely hissing flaming bomb, used to disastrous effect on the now-lost fourth Inca craft. The black leader roared at the men as they approached with the flames, and pointed with seething anger at Scholar Capac's slowly retreating craft, partly visible through the plant-life beside the river. Without missing a step, the hardy invaders battled into dense foliage beside the river carrying their payloads of disaster, their intent plain to see for any man. They intended Scholar Capac to burn also.

The man in black was a demon, and evil spilled from his body in dark clouds that seemed to infect all those around him. Vicaquiro caught a genius-driven madness in the man's dark expression, and knew then that he was a ruthless killer.

Alarm rose, and, slipping silently back into the murky waters of the river, Vicaquiro took a deep breath and again swam beneath the surface for as long as he could manage. He knew the dense trees and undergrowth would hide the flame soldiers as they moved along the riverbank to gain position. At this distance from the waterfall, the terrain began to smooth and the tangled rainforest plants grew with increased vigour beside the great waterway as conditions changed to suit them better. Scholar Capac had to be warned of the imminent danger hidden within, or else he would also surely burn.

Breaking the surface with lungs burning, Vicaquiro immediately relegated all aches and injuries to the basement of his conscious thought. His malachite-green eyes fixed on the too-slowly-escaping craft ahead of him, and he began to stroke amid the caresses of the purposeful current in an attempt to reach it and give warning before disaster struck.

He'd made about half the distance when his heart sank. Vicaquiro saw with growing chills that a number of flame soldiers had made quick progress along the banks of the river, and were now popping out from the green folds of plant-life directly opposite Capac and his crew of refugees. All aboard had their attentions turned to picking up sodden survivors of his own craft, and he noted Evitrea's mother and child climb up to the decking with a nod of approval, but none seemed to have noted the new threat.

Vicaquiro yelled at the top of his lungs. "Capac!"

The old man, still perched on the upper deck, immediately looked up and searched the river for the source of the name caller.

Vicaquiro waved with urgency. "Capac!" he yelled again. "The riverbank! Move!"

The elderly scholar waved in reply, immediately seeing his upraised hand. But still wasn't looking toward the danger.

"Capac!" He yelled harder, and pointed with jagged stabs. "The riverbank!"

The robed scholar's head immediately whipped around, and Vicaquiro heard the man's curse as he realised all too late he'd been caught napping. He looked back in Vicaquiro's direction and motioned energetically for him get a move on, but almost at the same time, a spluttering yellow firebomb arched its way across the river.

The bomb landed short and plonked beneath the water with a hissing musical note, but three others immediately followed it. Vicaquiro thrashed and swam for all he was worth. Two bombs landed perilously close, the third scored a direct hit and spread flames ruinously over the lower decks. Capac yelled in response, and two men immediately up-ended a sack of grain over the spreading flames to smother them.

Capac yelled again and ordered the paddlers to life, unable to hold station a moment longer. He again looked up to search out Vicaquiro, then looked to the Sunchildren-riddled riverbank, and then back to Vicaquiro. He became crestfallen.

As if to add to Vicaquiro's dire straits, he again came under fire from the rock-slinging enemy, obviously having fashioned replacement slings. Sizable deep-thudding explosions rained around him, sending up angry geysers, but he kept stroking furiously, despite the very real danger. Firebombs continued to launch from the riverbank as the Sunchildren attempted to keep pace with the escaping vessel, and Capac ordered the paddlers increase their stroke rate in response.

Vicaquiro's arms burned, his body on fire with overstressed fatigue, and his breaths came in tortured gasps. In that moment, he knew his attempt was futile. Capac had gained too much speed, in a desperate effort to avoid their own deaths, and he knew he now had no chance of catching them.

With bitter resignation, he stopped, and raised a bone weary arm from the water in a wave of farewell. Even from this distance, he saw the scholar's drooping and resigned shoulders as he raised his own hand high in return. Vicaquiro's daughter stood beside the old man, but rushed to the railing amid wrenching screams and waving furiously impassioned pleas. He could do nothing but wave back to her, tears brimming forth to fog his vision.

Rock projectiles slammed the water around Force Leader Atoc Vicaquiro with renewed ferocity, hunting for his death, and although the will to live had drawn perilously thin, he dived beneath the tannin-infused waters one final time to escape the danger, and vanished. Although the Spanish Conquistadors searched for his body, the demon with the golden blade was never seen again.

Slowly, the fleeing Inca vessel became smaller with distance, its paddlers smoothing their rhythm through the water, propelling the stout craft away from the thwarted enemy. Eventually, the mists of the vast forest swallowed them in a timeless embrace, as if they had never been. It was the last time any Inca or Spanish eyes saw the strange ships, the people aboard, or the mysterious cargo they carried.

Natives of the rainforest would tell stories for generations, of Gods who came upon the river aboard vast canoes, with golden objects and strange clothing. For a time, the stories thrived amid tribal folklore, handed down from generation to generation, and told by smoking fires at night. But the tribes warred and changed as the years passed, eventually leaving the mysterious travellers known only to the rising mists of the endless rainforest, and by the age-old boughs overhanging the lost and forgotten river.

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	2. Beginnings

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**This is the first work written for this story. The absolute very first words I set down in stone.  
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**This chapter took many months to write. Never satisfied, I chopped, changed and re-wrote portions of it many times over. Being my first real foray into creative writing, it was pretty raw and didn't read all that well. After so many revisits though, I had to like it and move on, but I still consider it a touch underdone and raw. I started writing about a character closely modeled on Lara Croft and the world she lived in. After a while, I realised the character I'd been writing about _was_ Lara Croft. So I re-wrote the material I had as a Tomb Raider story. I guess I'm making Lara the character I always thought she'd be, a tough, kick ass lady that people mess with at their peril. For Winston? Apologies all, but the farting old man from Tomb Raider II is gone. I've toughened him up considerably and put a gun in his hand. Lara's butler has to move with the times also.**

**There are elements I like from this early work, but it certainly needs refinement. You should get the general idea though.  
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**Beginnings**

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**The Dense Rainforest of Bolivia  
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**L**ara stepped lightly along the deep forest path, the trees and undergrowth almost making a complete tunnel as it wound its way through the greenery. She was being followed, almost for an hour now. Just who might be interested in her explorations, she didn't know. Her follower kept well back and was almost silent. Many people would have dismissed the odd distant tingle of unknown equipment, or decided the odd heavy footfall was something else. Lara however, did not miss these details. Something deep in her consciousness had warned that she was not alone. A minute change in the chorus of birds and insects, silences when there should be none, or the odd chink of metal on metal.

Leaves had been falling for some time, covering parts of the little-used path and Lara took care to step around the individual leaf clumps that had begun to accumulate in the tropical breeze. She wasn't going to make things easy for the follower. She had a hunch that whoever it was, they were likely not looking to make friends. Lara was tall at 6 feet two inches but she was able to move her lithe body through the terrain with minimal disturbance. She was in her element, and relished the chance to outwit this unknown entity.

She stopped and looked up as the breeze momentarily strengthened and ruffled the tops of the trees, some 40 meters above. Silently, she moved to the shadows along the edge of the path and waited for the disturbance to settle. The sprightly breeze descended, causing Lara's long ponytail to sway and catch slightly on her backpack. Her focus elsewhere, she tossed her head lightly, causing it to fall to it's rightful position just past the small of her back. As the disturbance died she listened. The forest chorus began it's rhythmic beat once more and the silence returned, but Lara lingered a moment to ensure nothing had transpired during the noisy intermission.

Lara continued. Looking ahead, her eyes focused on some broken stonework that lay across the path, partly hidden amongst the fallen leaves. She reached the spot and crouched down to study the pieces. A droplet of sweat ran the length of her forearm as she reached out to brush the leaves away; the tropical humidity had kept Lara sweating from the moment the sun rose that morning. She'd hardly noticed though, as the area was breathtakingly rugged and offered views rarely seen. Lara absently ran her forearm across her uncovered midriff to remove the offending bead, but seemed to gather others in the process.

Ever so gently, Lara removed one of the stone pieces from its resting place. As she brushed the fine volcanic-black sand grains from its surface, she suddenly paused as she noticed the nearly worn away designs on the face she now studied. Lara gently brushed the remaining soil away to reveal a series of interwoven snakes, all tightly coiled around each other and interlocking in a fashion reminiscent of Celtic scrollwork. The design was unmistakable to her. Flipping her ponytail aside, she reached into her backpack and produced another stone piece that had similar interwoven snakes carved into its surface. Holding the two pieces together, Lara could plainly see that the designs were identical.

"Gotcha!" she murmured with satisfaction. She'd found another marker.

There were nine stone markers that Lara had discovered so far. Standing no more than two meters tall they had all been pyramid shaped and around half a meter across the base. Each one had featured the intricate interwoven snakes, plus other symbols that had appeared to be some form of ancient writing. Lara had a working knowledge of many ancient languages, but this was something else, something new.

None of the stone pyramids had been in a good condition. Left at the mercy of the tropical forest and it's moisture laden climate; they had all clearly suffered in the open. They were old, very old; that much she knew. Some, like the one where Lara now stood were reduced to rubble, soon to be lost in the thick undergrowth or swallowed into the dark volcanic soils. Others had fared better and were nearly complete, save for relentless weathering that had smoothed their surfaces and made the carvings all but disappear. Lara only had a few fragments containing designs, plus a small number of well-worn symbols. It wasn't much to go on, but as with all things ancient, there often wasn't.

Clipped to the front of her belt, was a compact GPS unit. Highly accurate, it could pinpoint Lara's location to within one meter. She unclipped it and took a positional fix of the markers location. An intriguing pattern was emerging. Lara flipped through a series of menu's to produce a graphical display of all nine markers. Her eye's narrowed with interest as the latest marker's position confirmed her hunch; the nine marker positions she'd captured so far were beginning to map out in a circle. Deftly, Lara navigated through some additional menu's to bring up some drawing tools. She then drew a circle of best fit over all nine points and paused to consider her handiwork. Staring intently at the little screen, her mind began working though the question of weather the circle meant anything. She rolled her head from side to side to stretch her neck muscles, all the while keeping her eyes trained on the circle; the soothing sensation helping her thoughts meld into a conclusion. What would you do with a stone circle? She wondered. Put something in the middle of course! But what?

Once more, Lara's fingertips danced over the GPS unit's keypad; she plotted the circle's center point, and calculated its position. She then chose the 'navigate' function and a large arrow appeared on the little screen, along with the information _2.6 kilometers to target._ Looking in the direction the GPS indicated, Lara saw dense and dark steaming jungle. _Not_ easy terrain. She sighed, and placed the GPS back on her belt.

Strapped to her back in a protective sheath was another piece of equipment, a machete. With a 60cm blade, wider at the tip than at the hilt, the cleaver-like weapon was the tool of choice for hacking through impassable jungle undergrowth. The machete also made a good offensive weapon in the hands of someone skilled enough. Lara _was_ such a person; she was 3rd Dan in martial arts. A significant part of that training was the ability to use all manner of weapons to dispatch an enemy.

The thought of killing another person reviled her, but it _had_ been necessary in the past. Lara reached for the machete's grip over her right shoulder and drew the weapon from its protective sheath. She twirled the blade several times in a circular motion to become re-acquainted with its balance. "Gardening time," Lara muttered as she stepped off the path and into the gloomy forest.

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**T**ezra Tekkara kept to the shadows as he silently stalked through the lush foliage. This land was the birthplace of his ancestors and he'd inherited their skills completely. Seeming to disappear in the muted light, he melded his body with that of a huge forest giant and completely stilled his body. He listened for the looping strokes of the tall woman's machete as she carved a path through the dense biomass. Tezra could tell she was skilled with the weapon; expending as little energy as possible with each constructed stroke.

The woman was an enigma. Definitely western, she had a European complexion that had been tanned through many hours outdoors. She didn't appear military, although the twin 9 millimeter Heckler and Koch USP's she had holstered at her hips suggested she meant business. The German made Universal Self-loading Pistols were semi-automatics, which meant that one round was fired with each pull of the trigger, and a new one loaded into the firing chamber automatically. The USP's also featured Heckler and Koch's recoil reduction system, which significantly reduced the recoil experienced by the shooter. The woman obviously knew her weapons, Tezra thought to himself. He could see she burned with a steely resolve and her intellect appeared considerable. He'd need to be careful.

He separated from the tree and resumed a cautious path after the tall woman, following exactly in her footsteps where he needed to pass through the dense vines and saplings. How much could she know? Tezra pondered. What had drawn her here to the home of his ancestors? What did she want here? Who was she?

Tezra kept pace with her for an hour; their progress slow due to the rough overgrown terrain. She seemed driven by something, though he had no knowledge of what it could be. She'd been interested in the small stone pyramids hidden in the forest, forgotten by all in the greater world except her. To his knowledge, the pyramids were nothing. His people thought them to be the boundary of a ceremonial area in ancient times. _Although_ a lot of knowledge had been lost during the siege of the Spanish Conquistadors in the 16th century. His people had been driven to the edge of annihilation, but a very small number had escaped and went into hiding in distant lands.

His ancestors had lived in extensive underground cities built through large cave networks. The Conquistadors had found some of them during their malignant march across the land; those were supposedly reduced to rubble. Time had now faded knowledge of the cities his people built. To this very day, Tezra's people did not know if anything still existed un-discovered. Only faded memories had been passed from person to person since the exodus. The world had forgotten his people – until today.

He'd been contacted via his Globalstar GSP 1700 satellite phone. His father, in Washington, America; had called him earlier that day with the news that the company satellite feed had picked up an inbound helicopter. Tezra knew the drill, follow the intruders and discover what they wanted. If they took too much of a liking to the area – well – the Bolivian rainforest was a dangerous place.

Eventually, the machete fell silent. Tezra immediately stopped and once again blended into the shadows amid a dense thicket of saplings. He waited; wondering what the enigma-woman's next move would be. Tezra knew the area, and knew that there was nothing significant here. What _was_ she doing? He needed to find out, and began a wraith-like stalk in the direction of the last sounds he'd heard.

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**T**he GPS buzzed its message that the destination had been reached; Lara silenced it with a simple button push. Thin shafts of light penetrated the thick overhead canopy and appeared like swords as they thrust into the forest floor. Lara had descended into a bowl shaped area no more than 50 meters across. Standing in the center, she slowly turned examining the rocky ridge that created the outer wall of the bowl formation. There was no breeze where Lara stood; making the ever-present humidity seem to close in around her producing a wet sheen on the surface of her skin. She flexed both arms above her head and stretched; the machete work had tightened her muscles somewhat. Lara wasn't overly muscular, but her muscle tone was lightly defined in a very fit manner over her entire body. In her line of work she needed to remain fit, or else suffer in the outdoors. Her midriff shirt was damp from her exertions; however, it was doing its job keeping her cool in the moisture-laden air.

Lara continued to turn slowly in the center of the bowl. She noted with a growing sense of discovery that it appeared quite regular in shape, seeming to be almost perfectly round. The rocky walls were no more than ten meters high and fairly angular in shape. The area wasn't particularly overgrown either, which seemed odd as almost every spare space had otherwise been claimed by some forest plant or other. Only a few small broadleaf plants grew in the confines of the space.

Ferns had covered one part of the wall where the slope had actually become more vertical than the rest of the bowl formation. Long green tendrils draped their way down the small cliff producing an evergreen curtain hiding the grey rock beneath. Lara stepped cautiously; her mind shifting up a notch to another level of clarity. As she neared the lush-green curtain, her crystal mind noted the relative smoothness of the rock becoming evident between the ferns. Noted the slight fall in ground level at the base of the curtain, as well as two identical protrusions half way up the cliff. Also registering, was the-not too-distant disturbance of some Bolivian Macaws. They had suddenly screeched and taken flight as if a forest phantom had appeared from the ether. Lara knew though, that her follower had returned. She instinctively patted the grips of her always-present Heckler and Koch pistols, their presence always a welcome reassurance.

Lara scanned the rock face covered by the ferns. The two protrusions were about half way up the rock face. She'd need to climb a little in order to reach them. Stepping directly up to the rock face, Lara scanned it for footholds.

_Crack!_  
…What on earth?_  
Craaaaaaaack!_

The ground appeared to heave beneath Lara's feet. She was losing her balance amid a loud noise that sounded like a hundred shotguns being fired one after the other. She attempted to right herself.

No Good.

The loud noise rose up in an ever-increasing crescendo, the rolling forest floor causing Lara to stumble wildly; she groped for the ferns in a desperate attempt for balance.

Then it went silent.

"Ooooooh crap," Lara breathed, as if to pacify a demon tormenting her.

Her mind raced and grappled for answers, she stood frozen where she'd been thrown, as if by some malevolent hand come to punish her. She realized the forest floor had taken on a nasty angle; she peered at the ground immediately around her and all too late her crystalline mind found the answer. Suddenly, with a banshee-like wail seeming to come from the very earth, Lara dropped like a stone into unseen depths.

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**L**ara fell through inky blackness for what seemed like an eternity. With lightening reflexes she steeled her body for an impact she knew must come.

It did come, but it wasn't what she expected.

With an almost deafening splash, Lara hit a deep body of water, and crashed below the surface, it's enveloping embrace closing in around her like the arms of death. It was dark like the deepest cave; the dark water almost chilled, causing her a momentary shock as her mind thundered to catch up with events. She willed herself back to cognizance.

It was quiet. There was no noise but for her own motions in the blacked-out water. She had no idea which way was up, sideways, or down. She reached for a side pocket on her ever-trusted backpack and produced a green tinged plastic tube. Holding her breath in the blackness, Lara bent the malleable plastic causing delicate glass vials inside to break and spill their chemical contents. As she did so, a bright chemo-luminescent light began to shine from the mixed chemicals. Lara shook the tube vigorously; the green glow strengthened and Lara found herself staring at a smooth rocky surface no more than two meters away. It was the bottom of the water body.

Lara kicked down towards the smooth bedrock; spun around and used it to kick off towards the surface.

The tranquil water erupted as Lara broke the surface and filled her lungs with fresh subterranean air. Looking off to her left at some distance, Lara could see a shaft of light cutting through the darkness. It was the now-opened trapdoor she had fallen through. She estimated she'd fallen a good 10 meters. The light shaft was growing smaller before her eyes; Lara realized she must have fallen into an underground river that was now transporting her away from the trapdoor.

Holding up the glowstick, Lara could see the walls of the tunnel through which the river flowed. They were also smooth like the riverbed, worn from the constantly flowing water. The speed at which the walls passed told her she was indeed moving at quite a pace. Pointless to try swimming against the current; Lara knew it would be an exercise in futility. The tunnel was perhaps five meters across, and for now the water's passage was tranquil. She looked ahead but only saw the tunnel stretching out into the distance, growing black quickly beyond the green light of the glowstick.

Lara floated on her back to avoid any submerged dangers; she held the luminescent tube above her body to study the tunnel walls as they passed by. She could barely make out the tunnel roof, still some 10 meters above her. What had she gotten herself into this time? She pondered.

Lara had been in situations like this before, and she lived for them. Where others may panic, Lara found herself immersed in a sense of wonder at discovering the unknown. Eventual death from such an experience was a real possibility, but strangely, Lara didn't fear death as others might. She'd never feared death.

With her mother and father both dead, she had no immediate family. No brothers, no sisters to mourn her passing. She'd had lovers, but those relationships ultimately left her empty and searching for more. There were several eligible bachelors whom she could marry, if she wanted, but that life held no interest for her; none at all. Subterranean rivers were her life, lost ruins, civilizations long forgotten, tombs of ancient emperors, epic journeys long since finished, and her ultimate love, the gathering of rare and ancient artifacts.

Lara had been carried along by the mystic river only a short while when she began to note the ceiling descend toward the waterline. As she traveled further it was apparent her pace was quickening; the sounds of rushing, gurgling water also began to emerge from the blackness ahead. As her pace quickened ever more, Lara began to hyperventilate to cram as much oxygen into her bloodstream as possible. She knew that subterranean river systems could be perilously dangerous, often submerging without air pockets for miles at a time. Unbidden feelings welled up within her that screamed warning. Her gaze became granite as the realization struck that things were about to become treacherous.

The ceiling began coming down quickly now, the gurgling noise also rising as if it expected a fresh victim. Lara rolled onto her front and continued hyperventilating. She steeled herself as she began to be jostled by the water, now beginning to roil angrily about her as it hurled her down into the black gullet of the river tunnel.

Lara saw the ceiling hit the water ahead amid the green luminescence of the glowstick; a maelstrom of churning water had formed there creating a zone of brutal chaos. There was a whirlpool, angrily spinning and sucking the last vestiges of sanity from the free space left in the tunnel. The water protested loudly in boiling waves as it was sucked without mercy straight down to the pits of hell. Lara rushed headlong toward the beast without hope of escape; she took a deep breath that she knew could be her last.

Suddenly, she was pulled from the river tunnel with such malevolence that the air held in her lungs came perilously close to being punched from her body. Brutal forces took hold and she was viciously whipped into a narrow flooded tube and accelerated though it like the condemned on their trip to the underworld.

_Wham!_

Lara's shoulder blade collided with the roof of the tunnel. Her shirtsleeve ceased to exist, obliterated and torn by the scraping collision.

Pain exploded.

Her arm was still there; at least that was something.

Lara fought for control, but it was useless, the current far too venomous. Her body buffeted, she fought to keep her lungs from filling with water. Unseen boxers pummeled her from each direction as the water sped and boiled through the narrow space.

She was wrenched without mercy around a bloodthirsty turn. With milliseconds to spare, Lara managed to fend off the cave wall by planting both feet into it as she rocketed past.

She was now hurtling along backwards, the defensive move having turned her around. The glowstick was battered from her grip and became lost in the hell-bent torrent, sending her decaying world into darkness.

Another series of militant pressure waves hit her body and forced air from her lungs; Lara's calm center began to fade. Her crystalline self-awareness began to shatter and break apart. With immense self-control she wrenched it steady through a brutal tide of willpower.

Time was limited. She was taking a battering the human body was not meant to take. She couldn't hold out much longer, her exertions having cost her precious oxygen. She sensed her mind dulling rapidly as her brain began to feel the effects of oxygen debt. She could see nothing; yet unseen phantoms continued to pound the life out of her.

She was going out.

Her body began to shut down; Lara no longer able to make it respond no matter how much willpower she expended. Yet her spark remained, burning with passion at the center of her being.

_Air!_

Suddenly she was tumbling through space. Instinct made her raggedly gasp for a precious breath. She fell amid the roar of malevolent rain. Pure instinct made her straighten into a dive and once again prepare for the impact her battered mind knew must come.

It did.

Lara hit the surface of a large pool and was once again propelled into the unknown depths. Except this time her glowstick was there waiting for her, resting on the rocky bottom of the pool radiating its subtle green glow. Using the glow to orient herself, Lara kicked away from the light with her rapidly draining reserves of strength.

The tranquility of the water's surface was pierced by the eruption of Lara Croft from its depths. With more ragged gasps she filled her lungs with the earthy subterranean air, which tasted as sweet as she'd ever remembered.

Lara dragged herself through the water with spent strokes to the nearest shallow ledge she could find. She turned on her back and rested in the shallow water with eyes closed. Adrenalin still coursed through her body like the blazes, her heartbeat racing; it thumped in her heaving chest attempting to re-oxygenate her overstressed body. She took in several slow deep breaths to begin a process of calming. Unclasping the machete and backpack, she flung them on a dry ledge nearby. Similarly, she took off her drowned belt with her holstered Heckler and Koch pistols and her GPS; she flung these on top of her backpack.

She rested sodden and bruised, waiting for the world to right itself.

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**W**inston Banks sat bolt upright from a dead-slumber. A light sleeper, something had disturbed his subconscious and screamed warning. His eyes flicked to the red glowing numbers on his simple bedside alarm clock. 3:17am. The night was stilled, barely a whisper echoed through the Croft Mansion; yet something had wrenched him from sleep.

Pushing 67, Winston was Lady Croft's Butler. Lara trusted no one else with the care of her family home, at all. Since the deaths of Lara's parents, Winston had taken it upon himself to be as much of a surrogate father as possible. There was no way on this Earth he could replace Lord Richard and Lady Amelia Croft, but he'd damn well rot in hell before he gave up on the last remaining Croft.

A growing sense of unease pushed at the edges of his sleep-fouled mind. He was fast becoming an old man and knew it all too well. He lamented the precious time lost as he worked his mind into cognizant thought; he needed to get up, and right now. Something was very very wrong and he shuddered as if an icy shadow had suddenly passed over him. Silently, he slipped the covers off from over him and stood beside the bed in the blackness.

Still with no idea what had caused him to wake, Winston slipped into his sheep's wool slippers and stepped without noise to a locked cabinet only a few paces away. Even through the inky void of night, Winston knew exactly where to reach behind the cabinet for it's key. He needed a better place to hide the key he thought, but he'd been saying that for years. The key turned easily in the well oiled lock and the metal door swung open on equally well cared for hinges.

A Westley Richards side-by-side double-barreled bespoke shotgun rested easily on it's mountings inside. It's silverwork engraving gleamed even in the soft moonlight which barely lit Winston's modest room. The gun was a typical example of a British sportsman's hunting weapon, although somewhat more ornate. Winston had no idea of the gun's value and wasn't interested in the figure at all. It had been in his family a long time and he wasn't about to sell it to some other buffoon.

Also hanging in the cabinet was a somewhat more modern bulletproof vest. Lara's idea. She'd insisted he keep it close to hand some years ago after a break in. Although secure with sophisticated security systems, the Croft mansion had a history of unwelcome visitors. Winston now slipped the vest over his head gratefully and adjusted it around his long john pajamas. Lara had a foresight that seemed uncanny at times, just like the Lady Amelia, her mother. So like her own mother, more than even she knew.

Winston reached for the Westley Richards and also slung his old leather cartridge belt over his shoulder. In the silent shadows, he was damned if he knew what had gotten him on the razors edge like this, but he'd learned to trust his instincts over the years. Lara had drummed _that_ into him. He knew the mind was a complex machine; a weapon in itself if one could but harness its power.

He stepped to the polished wooden door and listened intently. There _was_ something! Voices. Very faint, as if carried up the central stairwell on errant eddies if air. Someone _was_ in the house! Lara was in Bolivia at this very moment so it certainly wasn't her. He heard breaking glass, also faint. Trouble.

Winston slipped the door open and peered out into the dark corridor beyond. Nothing. Which he could see anyway. He heard more glass shattering, plus the distinct sounds of something wooden being torn apart and thrown around. Also in the mix were the garbled voices from moments before, but still he couldn't tell what they were saying. Whoever the miscreants were, they weren't on a social visit.

Flipping a leaver on the Westley Richards, Winston broke open the gun's breech and slipped a live cartridge into each firing chamber. He was a member of the local clay pigeon shooting club, and even in the darkness his well-practiced hands never faltered in their task, having done it many times before. His buckshot shells would be no match for vests like his own, but they still packed a fair punch, and besides, he didn't exactly have anything else to hand. He checked the shotgun's twin triggers and silently snapped the breech closed, then took a deep, calming breath to ready himself.

Padding on his sheep's wool slippers, Winston worked his way up the corridor and leaned over the railing at the central stair well. Moonlight illuminated the sandstone walls, but it's feeble light was lost in the cloying blackness of the staircase below. The voices were still there, carried up in unseen waves.

The carpeted stairs added extra muffling to Winston's footsteps as he worked his way down to the first landing. Peering, he found it difficult to see amongst the shadows of the lower main hall. He saw no movement but….

There was a noise. Movement in a leather recliner.

Someone was there, sitting by the fireplace.

Voices echoed from the hallway to the right. Louder now. Discernable.

"The bitch hides her trinkets well! Too damn well!"  
"Easy Gareth!" another voice said. Male. Deep. "Focus! We don't have long. That trick we pulled with the security system will trip out in seven, maybe ten minutes! _Keep_ _looking!"_  
"The mansion is huge!" The first voice again, male, Spanish accent. "It could be anywhere!"  
"It's here! _Lady_ Croft would hide it in here!" Said with venom. "Her _treasure_ room; the pathetic bitch knows nothing of it's real value."

_Jesus Christ!_ Thought Winston. The intruders had gotten into Lara's treasure room! Only one person on the planet had access to that room. Lara. Even he didn't know how Lara gained access. He knew where it was, but that was all. The items in that room were of incalculable value. Not to mention the Croft family Heirlooms that had always bought a tear to Lara's eyes. Her mother loved them.

Winston acted. He descended the last 30 steps to the ground floor stonework with purpose. The man by the fireplace was facing away from him, so Winston slipped past behind and made for the hallway leading to the treasure room entry. With growing unease he noted the treasure room door had not been forced. All wooden paneling remained as exquisitely finished as the day it was made. Yet the door stood open.

A line of golden light ran up the wall opposite the door. Winston paused to let his eyes adjust to the extra light. He eased the safety off the ornate shotgun and checked his spare shells moved easily in his cartridge belt. He was too damn old for capers like this he thought with a muffled laugh. He should be relaxing with a single malt whiskey right now. Not running into gunfights at 3am.

"Rodriguez! Is that you?" The deep voice suddenly boomed from the golden nimbus.

_Christ!_ Not good.

"What? I'm enjoying the fire!" the voice of the man from the fireplace behind him called back. "Let's go! Before the old man hears us!"  
"Then who on God's Earth is.." A head popped from behind the treasure room entrance and looked directly at Winston.  
"Swords of Hell!" The deep voice roared. "He's here!"

Winston acted as fast as his 67 years allowed, and dropped to the floor as a .45 calibre bullet cracked through the night where his head had been moments before. He squeezed a trigger on the side-by-side and a tremendous boom rang out as he sent buckshot through the doorway into the treasure room. A yell of pain from within told him some of the shot had found a target.

Chaos ensued. Rodriguez reached around the corner from the main hallway and let fly with fully automatic fire that began ripping the wooden paneling to confetti. More .45 calibre shots cracked out from the treasure room. Winston gasped with pain as a slug hit his right calf muscle and blood began colouring his pale blue long johns.

He needed to move. He unloaded the 2nd barrel of the side-by-side in the direction of Rodriguez' rapid-fire hell. It fell silent, his clip spent, or his hands full of buckshot. Winston didn't care. He crouched up and hobbled to the end of the corridor as fast as his lame leg would allow, crimson spatterings following as he went.

"Jesus! Some type of cannon the old man's got!" Rodriguez yelled. "Damn near blew my hand off! We need to get rid of him! We're running out of time!"  
"Muffai is hit!" Shrilled Gareth in a rage from the treasure room. "I'll kill that old man!"  
"Keep looking for the pyramid!" Rodriguez yelled back. "I'll deal with the pain-in-the-ass butler!"

Winston hobbled. He'd reopened the Westley's breech and slipped two fresh cartridges in their places. The spent shells he dropped to the ground; the intruders knew where he was anyhow. His leg was on fire with pain, but he needed to keep moving if he had any chance of seeing the night through. The corridor opened out into Lara's swimming pool and gymnasium, Winston scanned the area for any possible cover.

The pools surface stood in eerie quiescence, reflecting perfectly the clouded moonlit sky above through the ornate vaulted glass roof. He made for a series of planter pots containing low hedge like shrubs along side the massive pool, and ducked behind them. Kneeling, he poked the shotgun's barrel through the greenery and took aim at the doorway though which he'd just come. This wasn't going to end well he thought as he steadied himself for what he knew must come.

"What's the old fossils name?" Rodriguez called out from the shadowed corridor.  
"Something like Wesley, or Wilbur, geez I dunno!" Gareth cracked out from further away, stress dripping from his words. Things weren't going to plan.

Rodriguez chuckled with a gravelly laugh. "Wilbur huh? Wilbur the gun-toting butler." He raised his voice to make sure Winston Heard. " Any thoughts on how you're getting out of this alive Wilbur? Tell you what! You come nice and quietly now, and that little bitch Lara can live. I'll finish _you_ quickly, you won't feel a thing!" He chuckled again. "What do you say?"

_Sod off!_ Winston thought. _I'll go to heaven when I'm good and ready!_ He firmed his grip on the shotgun and watched the doorway for _any_ movement. If they wanted him dead, they could damn well come and get him.

Rodriguez had anticipated his precarious situation and took a running dive through the entrance to the gymnasium, fully expecting the old man's cannon to be aimed his way. Winston was no slouch with a shotgun however, and his clay-pigeon-trained trigger finger didn't miss a beat. Another deafening boom rang out at Rodriguez in mid flight, sending more steel pellets into his thigh and down into his lower leg, causing him to howl out in pain.

"You fucking Bitch!" he yelled out as he crashed to the ground wounded. "You're going to pay for that you butler–ass bastard!"

Winston saw him go down and noted his hits with satisfaction. He also saw the Uzi 9mm in Rodriguez' blooded hands, which wasn't good at all. Even as Rodriguez hit the ground howling like a Banshee, he let fly at Winston's planter box with another hailstorm of 9mm parabellum bullets. So called for the parabola shape of the slug they contained.

The first round from the Uzi caught the lip of the planter box shattering up a small swarm of pottery shards. Winston dipped his head with nanoseconds to spare as the next few rounds tore the shrubbery to splinters. With his cover blown he knew he needed to move quickly. He half crawled, half scrambled along the line of planter pots running up the side of the pool. Using the cover of Rodriguez remaining Uzi-fire to mask his movements. His right leg was still bleeding and leaving a trail of blood wherever he went though, giving away his movements. Winston however, could not afford the time to staunch the bleeding.

The Uzi clip ran dry and Rodriguez cursed. "You fucking dead old man? Or are you still alive like the pain-in-the-ass you are?"

Winston heard the empty 9mm clip slide out from the Uzi and hit the marble floor. No fool, he immediately cracked the Westley's breech again and replaced the spent shell with another from his ammo belt. This time though, he took one of 3 tri-ball tungsten composite cartridges he'd made up at the club for a rainy day. Damn Lara had given him the 0.6-inch pellets years ago; he never thought he'd be unloading them into some damned fool with an Uzi.

Rodriguez heard the side-by-side snap closed and laughed. "You'd be better off sticking to your broomsticks you old fucking relic!" He gingerly stood and realized a good 8 or 10 steel birdshot pellets had penetrated his leg "And you can forget that bird-gun of yours!"

Winston was halfway up the pool crouched between two planter boxes. He knew his options were limited. Rodriguez had superior firepower, plus a good 35-year advantage on him. What the devil could he do next? He heard Rodriguez take a few tentative steps testing out his newly lamed leg, silently cursing as he found its limits. Immediately across the gymnasium from him, some 10 meters away, was the doorway to Lara's garage. It offered his only escape, but Winston knew he couldn't take much more of this shootout. He looked up to the vaulted glass ceiling above the swimming pool, noting the brightly trilling stars in the night sky; his years-formed cunning hatched a plan.

Rodriguez gingerly stepped out and immediately noted Winston's blood trail leading between two planter boxes half way up the pool. "Give it up you old fool," he growled shuffling closer. "Your dumb luck's run out. Accept your fate and be done with it!"

Another resounding boom lashed out across the darkened gymnasium. Rodriguez hesitated, unsure of what the old man was shooting at. Clearly something else in the…..

He had no further time to think, as his world became falling glass. "Christ!" he roared as he realized where the old fossil's wayward shot had been aimed. The vaulted glass roof above him exploded into a shower of deadly glass shards and began raining around him like revenge-bent demons. He leapt away from the pool with all the speed he could muster, firing the Uzi in wild arcs. Salvation was almost at hand as he landed and rolled from the carnage, coming to a stop in a kneeling position. Believing he'd escaped the falling death, he laughed, but immediately felt odd. "What the …..?"

Rodriguez knew he was dead. He had seconds left of life in this world. A large jagged glass sword protruded from his chest, causing blood to run freely. He saw the old man half stumble, half run through a doorway directly across from his fucking planter boxes. Rodriguez' body was sluggish, but he dispensed the last few remaining rounds in the Uzi at the old man before he disappeared through the doorway. His vision began to fade and his mind fogged over in a cloud of death. With one last effort, Rodriguez yelled. "Gareth!"

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**G**areth's head snapped up as a tremendous shattering racket bulldozed it's way into the treasure room. He said nothing, but glanced at Muffai who was now shirtless, having torn it into crude tourniquets to keep himself from dripping too much DNA evidence. Muffai was short at 5 foot, but was a burly barrel chested man with tree trunks for arms. He was Spanish, and ruthless. The birdshot had done no more than irritate him, having given him a series of angry pockmarks across his chest. He was fuming, Gareth knew. His darkened face betrayed his rage at having underestimated the old butler, whom he'd considered to be harmless. They'd checked him out of course, and found no history of violence at all. Just a typical English gentleman butler who should have posed no threat, plus he was an old man, their intel pegging his age at 67.

The crashing glass darkened his mood even more; their plan was to be in and out of the Croft mansion like wraiths in the night. Lara, hopefully taking months to discover the theft of the small pyramid they were seeking.

"Check that wall behind you for cavities," Muffai sighed; accepting their plans had gone to hell. "It must be in here."

Gareth dared not anger Muffai further and immediately swiveled around to face the sandstone wall behind him. He held a very sophisticated piece of technology in his hands. By emitting high frequency sound waves and measuring what returned to the device; it could detect the densities inside certain materials. Not a perfect science, but in the right hands the device could certainly be used to detect empty spaces within sandstone. Gareth adjusted the small receiving dish to face the wall and pulled the trigger on the device's pistol grip.

After a few moments data began to display on a small screen in glowing blue numbers. Each was a density reading. Gareth worked methodcically, aiming the device firstly along the bottom of the wall, then gradually working up it in rows.

As he pointed the device at an antique wooden bookshelf, Muffai tore it down without mercy, causing many Croft family antiques and heirlooms to crash violently to the floor, some shattering, others falling apart. This allowed the soundwaves from the device clear access to the wall and any secrets it may contain. Muffai had clearly abandoned the 'no mess' plan and was now bent on revenge and making Lara pay.

Gareth frowned and Muffai noticed the reaction instantly.

"Got something Gareth?" It was almost an order, rather than a question.

"Yes," Gareth replied looking intently at the readout on the small screen. "I read a sizeable cavity right about… There." He looked up and pointed directly to a spot at head height in center of the sandstone wall.  
Muffai grinned devilishly. "Then we'll have ourselves a little look-see eh amigo?"  
"The security system?" Gareth asked, "How much time have we got?"  
Muffai nodded, and checked the luminous dial on his wristwatch. "Not long. Stand back, things are about to get noisy. You better go check what Rodriguez' problems are."

They'd both heard Rodriguez call out minutes before, after the chaos of the falling glass. But Muffai was single minded in his purpose, and cared little if his team never made it. The Pyramid mattered. Cortez mattered, a man who could wipe them both from existence without a soul being any the wiser. The most dangerous man Muffai knew, you did not toy with William Cortez.

Muffai worked quickly, knowing the anti-hacking subroutines in Lara's security system would soon exterminate the little program they'd inserted to take it offline. As Gareth exited the room, his own Uzi in hand, Muffai reached into a small duffel bag and took out a longish strand of C4 explosive. Assassin and explosives expert, Muffai himself was a dangerous man, and was no stranger to the putty like substance now in his hands.

Moulding the C4 along the mortar around a single sandstone block, Muffai soon had the C4 attached to the area Gareth had indicated. He attached a simple radio controlled detonator by sticking it directly into the plastic substance. Wasting no time he rushed out of the treasure room and into the adjacent hallway. With no care for the additional contents of the treasure room, he pushed a button on a small sender unit in his pocket.

A loud crack burst from the treasure room along with a billowing cloud of sandstone dust. Even in the predawn gloom, Muffai noted the dustcloud with satisfaction, smirking at the havoc he was causing. The bitch Lara wouldn't be happy about him wrecking her home, but he didn't care. He'd deal with the aristocratic bitch later, if he needed to.

"Jesus Christ!" Gareth. "Rodriguez is fucking dead!" His voice called out from the darkness, panic rising.

Muffai sighed. _Damn amateurs_ he thought. Gareth was handy with security systems and technology, but useless when any blood appeared. "Look for the old man!" he yelled back. "Kill him if you find him!"  
"Jesus…"  
"Gareth! Focus! Look for the butler and shoot him!"  
"Okay, Jesus…. Okay"

Muffai entered the treasure room and grinned with delight. Two large sandstone blocks had blown out of the wall revealing a cavity beyond. Clicking on a small LED tactical torch, he stepped up to the destruction and searched inside. His eyes widened with joy as he caught the distinct shape of a small, ornately carved stone pyramid. His revelations were short lived however, because at that moment the Croft Mansion security systems came alive and a loud alarm began shattering the still night.

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**M**ichael Withmore sat reading the latest edition of Euro 4x4 in the Foxhound security HQ at Oxford. Suddenly an alarm sounded, making him jump in his seat. There were five different alarms his company used, each one denoting the type of security breach that had occurred with any one of their clients. The fifth alarm, he'd never heard in his entire seven years working nights in the Foxhound HQ, mainly because only 5 clients had that level of security protecting their premises. With a rising sense of urgency, Withmore realized the fifth alarm was the very one sounding now.

Throwing the magazine to the floor, Withmore tapped some keys on the console in front of him and sat shocked. The Croft Mansion was showing a large number of security breaches. With dread growing, he noticed a flashing icon in the corner of his display flagging a system compromise at the Mansion. He knew the Lady Croft was away, and that the only person out there was her elderly Butler.

"Shit!" he said to himself, his worry building.

Whithmore reached over and mashed down a communications button. "All units, all units, we have a code 5 at the Croft Mansion, multiple hits. Diagnostics report a high level hack on the system. No video feeds yet, system estimates first breach 40 minutes ago. Can anyone deal?"

For a few moments there was silence, it was a very big deal when one of their major clients had a break in of any kind. It hardly ever happened, as each major client had Foxhounds top of the line security system installs. But when it did happen, they had to respond like lightening.

A voice crackled out from the console. "Unit 16 with a copy. The Croft Manor? That's all we friggin need! That's one lady we can't afford to piss off! We're at the Oxford train station, can be at the manor in 15. Anyone closer?" It was Thompson and Maloney who were looking into some drunks with spray cans.

_15 minutes!_ Thought Whithmore. Not close enough for a code 5! He mashed the communications button once more. "Roger that unit 16, haul ass as soon as you can. Can anyone else deal? Code 5 people!"

The console crackled again. "Unit 12 with a copy. Don't get your panties all in a bunch HQ! Dan and me are 5 minutes out along Springrow Lane! Those vanishing cattle remember? On route to the Croft Manor now, be in touch when we get there." George Benson and Stan Forde. Wiseguys the both of them, but veterans at Foxhound.  
"Roger that Unit 12." Withmore replied. "Be on the lookout, high level hack could mean a pro job, you got your stunners charged?"  
"Yeah yeah, we charged em. We're not new at this you know."

Each Foxhound security officer was equipped with a Raysun X-1 stun weapon, which could launch two stun probes designed to hook into clothing and deliver continuous high voltage shocks to an opponent's body. Powered by a built-in rechargeable Lithium-Ion battery, they were extremely effective at stopping thugs in their tracks. Some of the new guys though, had recently been forgetting to charge them enough when off duty.

"Got it Unit 12, happy hunting."

Exhaling deeply, Withmore sat back in his leather bound console operator's chair and stared at the flashing high-level hack icon displayed on his screen. George and Stan were two of the best guys they had, yet he couldn't shake the icy cloud of uneasiness that had rolled over him and refused to let go.

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**W**inston knew he'd gained precious minutes. The security systems had finally kicked in and he knew that at that very moment, things would be happening over at the Oxford Foxhound HQ. They were an damn good outfit, and Winston knew that if he could hold off the intruders for a little longer, he might just get out of this with his derriere intact. The problem was, he was in trouble.

Two bullets from Rodriguez' last desperate shots had found their mark. One had gone clean through his left side and the other through his upper right arm. He'd found some small towels in the corridor near the pool, and used them as crude bandages to stop as much of the blood flowing as possible. His whole body resonated pain, and each step was becoming harder and harder to manifest. Yet his iron will pushed him onward. _Damn It but I could do with a scotch right now!_ He thought.

Shouts came from behind. Closer than they should be. The remaining intruders had picked up his bloody trail; an easy task considering the amount he was leaving behind.

Winston knew he had little time. He needed medical help quickly or else he'd bleed to death or fall unconscious from the pain. He finally reached Lara's garage and limped desperately along Lara's collection of automobiles. Lady Amelia's Rolls Royce Phantom II appeared in the gloom, but Winston straight refused the thought of bringing it to any harm. He looked at Lara's Hummer and field Jeep, but both were tricked to the hilt with technology Winston didn't have the foggiest about. He staggered on, past deep maroon 1932 V16 Madam X Cadillac sedan, and finally his eyes settled on Lord Richard Crofts 1966 red Aston Martin DB6. Now that _was_ an automobile he understood.

Lord Richard had always left the keys in the ignition, not wanting to damn well bother with locking them away, and then have to bother with fossicking about for them in a safe someplace. Winston silently praised the late Richard Croft's lax security habits and limped to the driver's door of the classic sports car. He hesitated, this had belonged to Lara's father, and he'd previously dared not touch the car unless under Lara's instruction, or before that from Lord Richard himself.

He had no further time to ponder however as Muffai and Gareth burst into the far end of the garage and spotted him. _Damn it to hell_! He lifted the handle on the Aston's door and crumpled into the black leather bound drivers seat, chased all the way by the malevolent shouts of the thugs coming after him.

The keys glinted lightly in the strengthening light of dawn, still hanging in the ignition where Lord Richard had left them many years ago. Without further thought, Winston twisted them in the ignition barrel and hit the starter button on the Aston's jet-black dashboard. Immediately the twin overhead camshaft six-cylinder engine began turning over with undeniable spirit. Lara had clearly been looking after it.

Then engine caught and roared to life just as a fusillade of bullets strafed across the Aston's windscreen, starring the glass badly with each hit. Winston mashed the remote controls for the roller door but realized too late he didn't have the time to wait for it to open. The thugs would be on him in seconds, and he couldn't let that happen.

Winston stomped the clutch and jammed the gear leaver to first. Then screamed the tyres as he fed the triple-carburetor six everything it would take. The Aston bolted from standstill like a stallion possessed. Winston heard loud single gunshots from the Colt .45 amid the chaos, immediately followed by the shattering of the Aston's rear window. He kept the accelerator to the floor however, and braced for impact with the roller door.

Screams of the devil erupted from the tortured metal of the roller door as the red Aston slammed through the small space that had opened, contorting the thin sheet metal in directions it was never designed to go. The windscreen gained more cracks through its structure, spidering their way along like cancerous tendrils bent on obliteration. Winston jolted in the leather seat from the impact, but kept a steady hand on the classic's steering wheel as he erupted from the garage and into the ever-strengthening dawn light.

Bullets chased him down from the ruined roller door and pocked into the Aston's aluminium bodywork. Lord Richard, bless the man, wouldn't be at all pleased. And there'd be explaining to do when Lara got home. Muffai and Gareth were venting their frustration at his escape by unloading their clips through the dawn mist at his retreating rear end; furious an old man had outplayed them.

Winston worked through the Aston's gears with well-oiled precision as he sped along the blue-metal driveway leading around the front of the Croft mansion. Another duty he'd taken on in recent years was that of Lara's chauffeur. Not content with basic driving skills, he'd taken it upon himself to get better, and had enrolled in several advanced driving courses. He was no silver demon behind the wheel, but neither was he some sedate grandma either. He was progressing damn well, even if he did say so himself! Lara had no idea about it though; he'd never had the damn chance to tell her!

Suddenly, bright lights blinded his vision.

_What the damn hell?_

Through the spearing light Winston made out the shape of a black Mercedes-Benz E-Class W211, complete with a thug toting an automatic assault rifle.

"Damn hell!"Winston cursed to himself. This was all he needed.

Winston spun the Aston's wheel sending it into a sideways drift across the Croft Mansion's exquisitely manicured lawns. Crashing through a planter box filled with Lady Amelia's yellow roses, he shifted up a gear and mashed the accelerator into the bottom of the footwell, hailed all the way by the thug's 5.56mm M-16. A ragged linework of bullet holes spread across the side of the highly polished Aston, marking it forever.

Blood fouled his grip on the stubby gear leaver, making it slippery and a devil to control. He'd been hit again. Only God knew where. Correcting out of the drift, he looked into the rear-view mirror and saw Gareth and Muffai though the ragged glass running up to the Mercedes and wrench open it's doors. This wasn't about to be over anytime soon.

Winston knew his time in this world was growing rapidly shorter. Badly hit now, he needed medical help quickly, or else he'd be before St Peter at the gates of heaven. His vision began turning a deathly shade of blue as he again willed the Aston to top gear and tore down the Croft Mansion entryway towards the wrought iron gates that marked the entrance to the mansion grounds. He knew he needed to gain as much distance as possible from the scum behind him, as the V8 engined Mercedes would soon be breathing down his exhaust lines.

The gates to the Croft Estate were left open these days to accommodate the changing times, and the mail delivery service. The red Aston shot through like a sheening bullet and entered a hedgerow lined entrance road leading a mile down to Croft lane, and hopefully salvation. The headlights of the Mercedes glinted in the rear view mirror like the stinging eyes of death with _him_ firmly in their sights. His right leg throbbed from the earlier hit, his lambswool slipper now slick with gathering blood. A gathering tide of pain was beginning to wash over him, threatening to take control.

Wiping more accumulating blood from the palm of his hand, Winston checked the safety on his antique shotgun, thrown onto the passenger seat in extreme haste. It was his only chance. The thugs would need to get close enough for him to use it however, a prospect he didn't enjoy.

Winston kept the Aston roaring along as fast as he dared, shaking his head intermittently to ward off permanent fogginess. A series of turns meant a necessary touch on the brakes and upshfting to keep the Aston on the straight and narrow. The 60's classic didn't complain however and took the rough handling in its stride. His sprint for freedom lasted only a few minutes uninterrupted. With a growing sense of inevitability, and deaths stare strengthening in the rear view mirror; over the full-throated roar of the Aston's triple carburetor six, Winston heard the cracking sounds of gunfire once again slam across the still dawn.

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**S**tan Forde sat behind the wheel of a Subaru Impreza WRX, which he kept under a tight reign as it flew along Croft Lane and towards the Croft estate. Slicing through the strengthening mist like a blade, he guided the vehicle over the undulating terrain with the skillful ease of a 20-year veteran. Stan was considered a legend at Foxhound. Having been with the Oxford Security firm since it began, he had the respect of every single person working under the Foxhound roof, along with a great portion of their client list, which was considerable. The fog outside had begun to trouble him, it severely reduced his ability to see anything significant in the distance ahead, and was making his task of navigating the narrow, hedge-lined laneway all the more difficult.

Sitting next to him in the passenger seat was George Benson, who, for reasons long since forgotten, everybody just called 'Dan'. The two men had been buddies since Dan had joined the firm almost 10 years ago, bringing them together for their fist assignment trailing a well-organized drug operation in the area.

Both sat in a jostled silence as Stan worked the turbocharged flat 4 engine heavily; something smelled bad about the situation at the Croft mansion and they'd needed to be there long before now. Dan had his six-inch-barreled Glock 20 out of its holster and encompassed in his granite grip, ready for any storm they might suddenly find themselves amid. The gun was a 10mm automatic and had a magazine capacity of 15 rounds, which proved very handy in a firefight. Dan had a nasty feeling he might need the weapon at any moment, and also peered into the fog ahead, trying to catch sight of anything at all that might prove trigger-happy.

Stan Forde spoke.

"Ok Dan this stinks." Stated plainly, no emotion. "If this is a pro job we'll be up against serious firepower. You remember that break-in Lara had 4 years back?" He glanced at his friend, brimming seriousness.  
"Man, I remember that," Dan replied with a deep exhale. "Serious business; those guys were tricked up to the hilt, walking hell almost."  
Stan gave a short laugh. "You said it partner, walking hell." He was instantly serious again, "If this gets out of hand we shoot to… _Christ!"_

Nothing further could escape Stan's lips. Trouble had found them.

Bolting from the enveloping embrace of the mist ahead was a red sports car; it wobbled precariously on the thin section of asphalted laneway, the driver clearly struggling to produce a straight line. The unmistakable muzzle flash of automatic weapons fire hounded it from behind attempting to send it to a bullet-ridden hell. The driver was either injured or attempting to avoid death. As the gap between them closed, a malevolent white smoke could be seen escaping from under the bonnet of the sports car, leaving cancerous jet trails as it forced exit from the engine bay and danced in the turbulent air behind the fleeing vehicle.

"Mother have mercy!" Dan exclaimed in low tones. "Who on God's Earth…"

Words ceased.

Stan jerked the Impreza's wheel and the all wheel driveline altered the vehicles course towards the right hand side of the lane with a lurch. Dan had the Impreza's window down in a flash and bought his Glock 20 to bear on the black wraith that pursued the sports car.

The windscreen of the sickened red stallion was badly damaged. Both men noted the older graying man at the wheel as it drew near, he jolted limply with each lurch that shook though the wounded beast; a clear sign he was in trouble. The door panels nearest them were severely pockmarked with ruinous bullet holes; it had clearly taken a monumental beating and wasn't going to hold out much longer.

"Winston!" Stan exclaimed in recognition. "And that is Lord Richard's Aston Martin! Dear God!"

Time slowed. The Aston flew beside them. Dan unloaded several shots into the pursuing black wraith's windscreen in front of the driver, then turned his attention to the thug hanging out the window pointing an automatic rifle at him, its muzzle flashing forth a withering tirade. The Impreza took several hits as Dan squeezed off additional rounds at the offending thug. Then, with lightening thought, he emptied his last three rounds into the rear tyre of what he now recognized was a black Mercedes E class.

Stan grimaced under the curse of pain, a crimson smear spreading over his left forearm, the result of a thug bullet. His steely resolve did not waver however and he threw the Impreza into a sideways slide to wash off its speed. The Mercedes, now past, had resumed peppering the Aston Martin, clearly intent on sending it and it's butler driver to the deepest, darkest, pits of hell.

The Impreza's speed dissipated quickly, though Stan could do nothing about the rapidly approaching hedgerow. He allowed the rear end of the vehicle to slide around 180 degrees and gunned the accelerator once again, violently jolting them both against their safety harnesses as opposing forces fought for supremacy. With a screeching crunch the Impreza solidly sideswiped the hedgerow, once again throwing them around like rag dolls, but also halting their remaining backward motion.

"Hell of a day at the office," Dan quipped as he slid another clip into his Glock 20.  
"You don't say!" Stan replied with a wry smile. "I just may just ask for a raise after _this_ day at the office!"

Stan slugged the accelerator once more and the Impreza bolted from the tangling clutches of the hedgerow, leaves flying as it vacated. The wraith-Mercedes was a half mile ahead by this time, though it was clearly now also having trouble holding a straight line, courtesy of a shredded rear right tyre. Roaring like a thoroughbred, the Impreza quickly gained speed under Stan's gifted control and savaged the distance between them and the one sided fight; it was time to even the odds a little and take some of the heat away from the badly battered Winston.

Their presence was instantly noted as they came up on the wildly veering Mercedes, a head appeared from the rear drivers side window brandishing what could only be a Colt .45 pistol.

"Incoming!" Stan said with force. "Colt 45! Give him hell partner!"

The Glock 20 came to life, cracking forth bolts of reckoning as Dan obliterated the rear windscreen of the thug vehicle ahead of them, causing it to veer even more wildly. The thug's Colt flashed in reply, badly starring the toughened glass windscreen of the Impreza and leaving neat round holes in the bonnet. Stan immediately began to swerve to avoid the death bent fire, making Dan's job all the more difficult, he was no amateur however and kept a well trained bead on the stinking viciousness in flight ahead.

Dan's clip ran dry, but Stan had managed to free his own Glock 20 and tapped his friend on the shoulder with it. Dan immediately took the replacement with a brief nod in reply and immediately resumed his assault. Arm out the passenger window, he kept his head behind the windscreen, which had been replaced with much thicker, toughened glass designed to aid in stopping bullets. With sustained assault however, the windscreen would soon shatter and both men knew this with clinical certainty.

Chips of black paint swarmed from the Mercedes' boot as two of Dan's shots missed their line. Correcting the error, Dan sent the remaining shots into the unprotected cabin space of the Mercedes, spraying the area with a liberal dose of 10mm justice. The result was deadly. The thug with the assault rifle turned, grimacing, and trained the deadly weapon on _them_ and pulled the trigger.

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**W**inston's breaths now came in ragged gasps, his tortured body fighting to cling to life with every last ounce of will he possessed. The Smiths temperature gauge on the dashboard was jammed in the red; the thoroughbred engine spewed forth a terminal cloud of smoke, filling the cabin with a stinging acrid stench, and Winston's blood was everywhere. Yet still he fought, still he clung to life through a sheer force of determination and steely resolve. He knew Foxhound had found him, and were gamely giving chase; that hadn't stopped the demons behind from trying to replace his butt with lead however.

The Aston Martin began to struggle and lose power; some cylinders in the engine began to misfire causing a death-heralding jolt with each missed stroke. Winston knew the game Aston Martin had only minutes at best, less in all probability, before the engine seized leaving him at the mercy of his executioners. His fogged mind noted he was no longer being peppered by automatic gunfire, but still heard the deathly tirade spew forth from somewhere behind him. The Foxhound chaps must be copping it he thought grimly.

Fighting for consciousness, Winston shakily reached over and took up the Westley Richards shotgun from the passenger seat and rested it across his lap, barrel resting in the space where the door window should have been, long since shot to pieces. He noted a thinner section of hedgerow approaching though the mist, looking as if some type of dreaded disease had been working it's way through the otherwise healthy plant life. A plan formed, a last desperate attempt to avoid death; he knew it was a long shot but to damn hell with it all!

With a poorly timed, last minute wrench of the steering wheel, Winston threw the Aston Martin into another screeching slide that put him on a collision course with the disease ridden section of hedgerow. He braced himself as best he could for the impact he'd now made unavoidable.

Banshees wailed and the horizon jolted wildly, a shower of glass erupted as the mortally wounded windscreen could no longer withstand the barrage it was being asked to endure. Winston was mercilessly whip-lashed with bone crunching force as the Aston punched through the hedgerow with a screaming shower of shattered branches and other angry debris ripped from their tranquil existence of mere moments before. Pain exploded through the butler's body at the renewed onslaught, causing him to cry out in a painful misery that halted the angels of heaven in their tracks.

Blackness descended over his body as it began to shut down. Winston fought it, clinging to his last remaining spark of life, knowing he had yet more to do in order to survive. The Aston's engine was in no better shape than he was, missing badly now amid an overheated pall of steam, fire, and smoke.

"Hell," He croaked in spent astonishment.

Flames had appeared, dancing and laughing at him as they leapt and spread their dire way across the front of the Aston, still managing to cling to it's last vestiges of life, gamely attempting freedom for it's brave driver now running from the man with the scythe as well as the killer wraith behind.

Battered, and with life ebbing, the Aston jolted over the uneven field in a last desperate attempt to escape. The Mercedes had not yet appeared through the blowout in the hedgerow, signaling to Winston that his risky plan had worked, for the moment.

Through the flames and smoke he noted a small drainage ditch at the bottom of the lush green hillside no more than 300 meters away, partly filled with water, it offered his only salvation from being burned alive inside the now fiercely burning vehicle. The engine shook violently and Winston knew it was terminal; he shot the clutch down and allowed the Aston to roll under gravity as the heroic 6 cylinder could give no more. Too badly wounded to escape the charring flames, Winston tightly held his side-by-side shotgun and focused on the approaching ditch filled with water. He could do no more. His fate was now in the hands of God.

The Mercedes shot through the hedgerow like the devil incarnate, roaring like an angry beast at feeding time. Winston noted its reappearance through the cracked rear view mirror with a growing sense of frustration and inevitable defeat. He blinked to clear the acrid smoke and choking heat from his overstressed eyes, and saw a smallish dark blue car with high visibility yellow pinstripes also bolt through the breach in the hedgerow in hot pursuit. Foxhound.

Winston sat at the edge of life's precipice. Only with fading cognizance did he feel the Aston's violent lurch and sudden jarring stop as it went over the edge of the drainage ditch and splashed down into the cold grey water. More banshees wailed in a terrifying chorus as the chilling force engulfed the superheated engine and the battered stallion came to rest half submerged, dipping down 30 degrees into the water. Winston hardly felt the cold water rise to his waist, as if to now wash his life away.

Blackness came.

After a time, somewhere out of the pall of blackess, a triumphant voice crowed beside him, seeming somewhat distant.

"Well, well, well. Wilbur! You fucking bitch! You're a pain in the ass! You know that! You gotta die now _Wilbur!_ Looks like you're already half way there anyhow." A chuckling laugh followed. "You've seen us see! Can _identify_ us. Can't have that." The chilling words spoke with pointed intent.

With a last effort borne of pure willpower, Winston cracked open an eye to see the barrel of an automatic rifle inches from his head, and the smiling malevolent face of the third thug from the black Mercedes. His hands were bloodied, and he sported gunshot wounds of his own, yet his eyes shone with drug-induced clarity. The thug was spewing out additional garbage as Winston flexed his submerged hand around both triggers on his faithful Westley Richards, still resting hidden by debris across his lap and unnoticed by the fool thug.

"Have fun in Hell _Wilbur!_" the thug was saying, an evil grin splashed all over his face.

"It's _Winston_ you little shit!" the butler croaked through tortured lungs. Then he pulled both triggers on the shotgun before blackness overcame him once more.

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**S**tan heard a terrifying boom echo across the countryside as he pulled up the Imprezza near the now vacated black Mercedes. An equally black helicopter now hovered some distance away with two human figures bolting for it across the cloddy green field. He opened his driver's door in a flash and bolted around Dan's side of the car, putting the vehicle between him and helicopter. Opening fire with his Glock 20, he hounded the two fleeing figures as they climbed up a ladder now dangling from the black machine, which he now recognized with icy dread as a Eurocopter Tiger attack helicopter.

Dan handed him another fully loaded clip from the passenger seat with an out of character shaking grip. Stan glanced at his friend momentarily, somewhat surprised by his sluggish behavior, and noticed for the first time the deathly shade of his complexion and blood spatters on the badly damaged windscreen in front of him.

He had no time to say or do anything. A high velocity gattling gun was opened up from the Eurocopter cutting the Impreza to shreds and causing Stan to dive for cover along side the vehicle. The gattling kept up its withering tirade as the Euorcopter powered up, rising into the air like an evil demon on wings of terror. As the demon came overhead the tirade stopped, the gunman no longer having a clear line of sight. Stan didn't move as it hovered momentarily, checking the scene, before angling off over the trees and away from the site of wrecked carnage.

The Eurocopter powered away, and Stan rolled from his position and wobbled up into a standing position. His leg had been hit by a flying piece of debris and blood seeped from the wound. With shooting pain he jerked the offending piece of metal from his thigh and threw it down with seething anger to the ground. Dan coughed with a gurgling sound from inside the swiss-cheese Impreza and Stan stiffened with dread at the death rattle escaping his friend's mouth. With one last penetrating gaze, he stared down the retreating form of the Eurocopter, now disappearing in the soft embrace of the mist, then hobbled to the side of his dying friend.


	3. Fallout

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**A rough first draft of chapter II. It needs to simmer while the rest of the story develops. Eventually, this will be re-written to better fit the final storyline. Because I don't exactly know what that is right now, it's just an outline, of sorts.**

**This is the introduction to some new characters of my own creation. My theory, was that you needed a proper introduction instead of a wishy washy gloss over that required the reader to fill in most of the blanks. Of course, you'll find out a lot more about them as the story progresses.**

**Once again this is fairly early work so you may need to be a little forgiving as you scan through it.  
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** Rock on readers! Or is that Raid On! :)**

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**Fallout**

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**Oxford, England.  
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**T**he mid morning sun glinted on the breeze ruffled waters of the river Cherwell, the light patches chasing each other in a never ending free-spirited frolic across the surface. Sunlight drenched the air as insects momentarily fluoresced in its brilliance before catching patches of shade and fading from view. The last vestiges of that mornings mist still clung to the shade in ever decreasing patches of vapour that would soon disappear under the warm glow of the sun and brilliant clear blue sky.

Near the heart of Oxford, the Cherwell held a steady stream of punts, flat-bottomed boats with square cut bows that were specifically designed for use on shallow rivers or other such waterways. The boats at Oxford sported highly polished woodwork that gleamed as people in their finery used 16 foot spruce poles to gain purchase on the river bottom and propel themselves along in long, graceful movements. The punts at Oxford were typically around seven meters long, and at only a meter wide, they required a 'punter' of some skill to keep them travelling in a straight line, particularly against a spirited breeze.

Amid the river's punters that morning, a striking woman made steady, skilled progress along the centre of the waterway, gaining admiring glances as she moved with strong deliberate strokes of her punters pole. Her long, honey-blonde hair cascaded half way down her back in a lightly waved waterfall that played in the breeze as she moved. Her light blue halter-top and white, loose flowing slacks seemed almost too casual for the setting amid her well-dressed counterparts on the river; she represented a new, modern generation of punting enthusiast. Fellow punters looked on with envy as she stood expertly balanced on her punt's deeply polished mahogany till, a small flat section at the stern of each vessel that punters stood upon while guiding their craft. Clear aquamarine eyes gazed forth across the wavelet-filled path ahead; reading eddies and swirls in the gently rippling river water as if they spoke to her in a silent language. Her purely feminine, yet striking facial features were set in light smile as she easily navigated the punt under a low bridge with twin brick domes offering passage to river users, also to the great envy of those nearby.

The punt emerged from the shadows beneath the bridge without issue, and as the woman again emerged into the sunshine, an insistent trilling sound broke the silence. It was a mobile phone. The woman sighed, and switched her style to a slower, one-handed poling technique, which had taken quite some time to master. Her free hand slipped inside a pocket in her white slacks and produced the offending silver-coloured device. She frowned slightly as the caller's number displaying on the screen was unfamiliar to her. Probably a wrong number, she thought as her thumb tapped the answer button.

"Hello?" She enquired. "This is Seheira Sahain speaking".

"Ms Sahain? Yes hello this is Malcolm Cullen of Foxhound security. I hope I haven't caught you at a bad time?"

Seheira's dark eyebrows set into a cautious frown. "No, Mr Cullen I'm not especially busy right now, just out getting some air… My house hasn't been broken into or something has it?"

"Oh no no," Cullen reassured her. "But I'm afraid something rather more sinister has happened earlier this morning"

Seheira froze, her spruce pole left trailing in the punt's wake. Icy dread went tingling through her body like a thousand tiny pin pricks. "What do you mean? What's happened?"

"It's nothing to do with your family or anything like that," Cullen replied immediately, sensing her alarm rising. "Early this morning there was a nasty incident out at the Croft mansion, you _do_ know that you are on Ms Lara Croft's emergency contact list?"

"Oh. Still?" Seheira said, somewhat surprised. "Lara Croft – I haven't spoken to her in years, not really since her father died. She… She became a different person after that. I'm not sure I can be any help to you Mr Cullen. Maybe her butler can help you?"

"Winston is in intensive care as we speak Ms Sahain. He was punched around pretty bad in the incident this morning."

Seheira, while absorbing Cullen's words, let the spruce pole slide through her hands once more until it hit the riverbed below, allowing her to continue propelling the punt forward. "Oh. Intensive care? That's awful!" She said with concern. "She also has some guys working for her doesn't she? Maybe they can help."

Cullen sighed. "_Had_ Ms Sahain. Alister Fletcher died recently in strange circumstances, Lara blames herself for his death but I can tell you there was nothing she could have done about it. Anyway… The other you speak of is Zip, Lara's tech expert. After Alister's death he left Lara's employ and I'm not sure where he's ended up now. You're the first person on Lara's contact list we've been able to get hold of."

Seheira thought on this and replied pensively, "I'm not sure I really want to be involved in any of this Mr Cullen. You make it sound like Lara isn't much fun to be around, people seem to be getting badly hurt or killed when they know her."

"I know how it sounds Seheira," Cullen said, addressing her by name. "But you spend some time with Lara and you'll soon realise she's a good person. It's just… The things she's seen. The places she's found. Things that shouldn't exist, yet, they do. Some very bad people want to know what _she_ knows, want to possess artefacts _she_ has collected; unfortunately, close friends have been caught in the crossfire. I've watched it all happen since she was a teenager, since you both came in to our office all those years ago in fact."

The breeze threw errant honey blonde strands across Seheira's face, playing in the gentle gusts like streamers. Deep in thought, a spark of injustice fired inside her and she suddenly felt sorry for her teenage school friend with impossibly long dark hair. Poor Lara she thought. What had happened to the happy, laughing girl she once knew? Winston in hospital? Friends dying in strange circumstances? It seemed Lara Croft needed _someone's_ help.

"Lara and I used to be close friends, it's true. I'd quite forgotten about going on her list of friends at Foxhound security. That seems like another life to me now though; does she really still want me meddling in her affairs? With her wealthy family, I never thought I'd actually be getting a call like this."

"I realise this is a little out of the blue for you Ms Sahain." Cullen was back to being more formal. "But you may be surprised to know that when I recently went over this list with Lara, she said you were as good a person as anyone who walks this Earth, and that I wasn't to contact you unless something untoward happened; said she couldn't bare the thought of you coming to harm on her account. She said she could trust you, even if you hadn't spoken in years. However, if you wanted nothing to do with her, then I can't pressure you."

"She actually said that?" Seheira asked.

"She said it Ms Sahain, I have the transcript of our conversation right here. Lara's life is," he struggled to find the right words, "difficult, and somewhat unconventional. But she is considered one of the best at what she does." He sighed. "She's in a difficult spot right now. Friends are thin on the ground for her it seems, ones she feels she can trust anyhow."

There was a short silence as Seheira thought this through. All the while propelling her punt along the Cherwell, almost on autopilot. The light of the sun warmed the skin on her bare arms and shoulders through her waterfalling hair, highlighting her aerobic fitness as she worked the spruce pole against the gravely bed of the river. She didn't know what to do in truth. Lara led a life of adventure, and danger it seemed. She was a simple British girl, a clinical psychologist, working from a respected clinic in Oxford, and doing the odd lecture on the subject at the university. But Lara was her friend, even if they _hadn't_ spoken in years. Could she really ignore her old school friend and wash her hands of it all? No. No she could not. She wasn't that kind of person.

"Okay, I'll do what I can to help her," she replied in thought. "What do you need from me Mr Cullen?"

"Where are you now?" he asked, somewhat relieved. "I need to talk to you in private."

"Well, I'm currently punting up the Cherwell River as it happens, I'm just coming up on the Victoria Arms, but I can head back to the boatshed at Wolfson College to meet you if you'd prefer?"

"Punting on the Cherwell? Oh I'm sorry Ms Sahain are you with someone? It's just that this situation is fairly urgent."

Seheira laughed. "No no Mr Cullen, I'm quite alone. Punting is a hobby of mine; it's very good for an upper body workout."

Cullen seemed perplexed, and momentarily light hearted as his analytical mind quested for answers. "But how are you punting and talking on your mobile at the same time? Are you just drifting?"

"Perish the thought!" She replied. "I've been punting since I was twelve, I'm working the pole one-handed and talking to you on the phone with the other."

"I thought that was pretty difficult, poling one-handed?"

"You get used to it. Like I say, I'm not new at this."

"I'll be damned," Cullen said light-heartedly. "Modern women of today!" He became business like again. "Look, can I meet you at the Victoria Arms in say 10 minutes? I'll have one of the lads here take your punt back to the boatshed at Wolfson College."

"Sure, okay. But I don't want a scratch on my punt!" Seheira replied with good nature. "I helped build her and she's my prized possession."

"Don't you worry about _that_ Ms Sahain," Cullen replied conspirationally. "The lads will answer to _me_ if there's a single mark on it. One of the benefits of being top man at an outfit like this."

"Done deal! I'll get us a table at the Victoria Arms, see you soon Mr Cullen."

The call ended and Seheira snapped her phone closed as she returned it to her pocket. Her day had taken an unexpected turn and she really didn't know what to make of it. Switching back to a more robust two-handed poling method, she soon had her punt travelling effortlessly over the small wind-blown wavelets of the Cherwell. As the Victoria Arms came into view on the grassed riverbank ahead, she couldn't help but wonder just what she was getting herself into.

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**M**alcolm Cullen checked the file photo of the woman he was about to meet, regretting not asking her if she'd changed her appearance, which, he reasoned, she probably had. The photograph showed two teenage girls in white blouses and pleated sport skirts, both with hair falling past their shoulders and playful smiles on their youthful faces. How quickly the years had passed he thought; it seemed only yesterday his secretary took the photo and filed it away as they all laughed in his office. Time seemed to slip by at an alarming rate these days he thought to himself, the photo must now be a good 10 years old. And _he_ was 60 years old just this month.

Trudging down a grassy bank at the Victoria Arms, Malcolm surveyed the gathered crowd. A group of students gathered around one table and hung off the words emanating from a small radio; the Australians were doing battle at Lords with the British cricket team and damned Ricky Ponting was being a devil with the bat. A family sat at another table playing some sort of board game, the children squealing with delight as something bad happened to their father's playing piece, causing a look of mock dismay across said father's face. Each table seemed filled. Then his eye's caught a striking woman sitting alone, her long blonde hair fanned out across her back and also trailing full length down beside her face, framing it perfectly.

There was no question. It was her. She hadn't changed appearances much at all, simply an older, more mature, twenty-something version of the girl in his photo. She had a fruit-filled glass of Pimm's and seemed to be staring off over the river deep in thought. As he approached her table, the woman shifted her gaze to fix on him with intelligent aquamarine eyes that spoke volumes of her self assured nature and tenacity. She was beautiful, very feminine, and full of life, which made Malcolm somewhat sad that he came to such a person as the bearer of news detailing the evil, dark, and dirty side of human nature.

She recognised him and smiled a friendly white smile.

"Mr Cullen?"

"One and the same!" Malcolm replied delighting in her youthful effervescence. "Thanks for meeting me, though I'm afraid we don't have much pleasant to discuss." He took a seat on the wooden bench opposite her and set down some paperwork he'd bought. He was troubled, and it showed. "We're still realising the full impact of what's happened, and to tell you the truth, its worrying Ms Sahain."

"Please, it's Seheira. I never was much for formalities."

"No, me either," Malcolm said with a sad smile. "Call me Malcolm."

"You look like you need a drink Malcolm, I can see something is troubling you."

A waiter came by and Malcolm ordered a Pimm's for himself before he replied, "Yes, this has got me worried. Poor old Winston is fighting for his life in Intensive Care and I can't get hold of Lara, she's in Bolivia, and if I know her, she's deep in the midst of some lost civilisation or other."

"Will Winston be ok?" Seheira asked, staring at him with a searching look.

"He's 67 now," Malcolm replied. "And he lost a lot of blood. But he's a tough old fox and we're all hopeful. The IC doctors say he's got every chance of pulling through."

"What on Earth happened?"

Malcolm spoke in even tones. "Early this morning there was a break in at the Croft mansion. It was a pro job. They bypassed our security systems out there with a method we've never seen before; my techs are still going through exactly how it worked. It looks like they attempted to do it by stealth, be in and out without Winston being any the wiser. Somehow they must have known Lara wasn't there.

We designed and installed an extremely high tech internal vault for Lara some years ago too, cutting edge stuff that only a few select clients have a need for and can afford. We found it wide open without a scratch on it, save for the blast hole the thugs made to access an internal cavity inside the vault. It all points to a very smooth and well-resourced operation.

Our best guess is that Winston crashed the party and they didn't like it. My best officer, Stan Forde, found him shot to pieces some miles from the mansion inside Lord Richard's Aston Martin, which was riddled with bullet holes.

"The criminals wanted Winston dead, because he'd seen them," Seheira stated, setting a level stare towards Malcolm.

"We can only guess, but those are my thoughts too," Malcolm replied, nodding in agreeance.

"What happens now?"

"I need you to come out to the Croft Estate and oversee the cleanup. Lara's instructions are _very_ specific. Only the people on her list can go inside the house and vault, anyone else can only enter at their discretion, and that includes me, after I've done my initial assessment. The police have been of course, but Stan Forde is out there, bandaged limbs and all, giving hell to anyone turning up and wanting to rummage around."

"Right now?" Seheira asked.

"Right now," Malcolm replied. "If it isn't asking too much. Remember though, that you are under no obligation. But..." He paused, thinking. "Please consider it. Lara needs our help, needs _your_ help. Remember this?" He produced the photo of Seheira and Lara as teenagers and handed it to her.

Seheira's face softened; absently combing her fingers through her long tresses, she studied the image. They'd been inseparable at one point, same clothes, same hairstyle, and same carefree lives. Had that Lara gone, or was she somewhere inside? Surely a decent friend was worth fighting for, even one you hadn't spoken to in 10 years.

"Let's go Malcolm. Right now."

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**A** dark blue Subaru Impreza with yellow high visibility pinstriping drove through the gates of the Croft Estate, it's tyres crunching on the bluemetal driveway as they tracked a course for the mansion's main entrance. A police van was also parked near the entrance, a plastic-suited forensics team brandishing evidence bags containing all manner of evidence attended it, clearly intent on uncovering the identity of the attackers. A heavyset man with wide shoulders stood guard by the door, dressed in the blue Foxhound security uniform, he had an expression and set jaw that commanded obeyance.

There was another vehicle; a sleek metallic-blue Jaguar XJ X351 parked further away along the road to the garage, but still with a view of who came and who went. Darkly tinted windows revealed little of the presence inside watching events unfold. It waited like a coiled panther, ready to pounce at the first sign of a suitable victim. No markings betrayed its origin; it's intent a mystery.

The Impreza rolled to a stop and it's burbling, highly tuned engine quit to silence. A greying man in his sixties exited from the driver's door, also heavyset, he moved with military precision and a sense of purpose that would not be denied, clearly a driven man. From the passenger's door a young woman with long, flowing blond hair emerged. She seemed oddly dressed for the situation in a light blue halter-top that revealed well-toned arms and aerobically fit shoulders. Her intelligent aquamarine eye's revealed a tenacious character that spoke volumes of an inherent fortitude.

The mismatched arrivals approached the wide-shouldered foxhound man guarding the door to the Croft mansion.

"Stan, how are you holding up?" Malcolm Cullen asked as he effortlessly climbed the few stairs to the doorway.

"I'll live Mal," Stan Forde replied. "There's plenty of life left in this old geezer yet!" He chuckled, and then became sombre. "Any news about Dan yet?"

Malcolm also became sombre. "No. But it isn't good. He lost a lot of blood. It's a damn miracle he's alive even now. They've put him in ICU next to Winston as it happens, under police guard."

Seheira came to stand by them both and their moods lightened. A conspirational twinkle even appeared in Stan's eye.

"So you've found the venerable Seheira Sahain I see, you didn't pull her out of a beauty contest did you?" He grinned at her and doffed his security-man's cap. "I'm Stan Forde, it's a pleasure to meet you. Though it's a pity we had to meet under these circumstances."

Seheira immediately liked the man. He was sincere and friendly, even if a bit roguish. "Beauty contest? Are you kidding? No freaking way! He dragged me off my Punt at Oxford, but still, I did get a free Pimm's out of it."

"Hmph!" Stan replied. "I never get a damned _thing_ out of him for free, you gotta let me know the secret. We're lucky to get cheap coffee out of him for the canteen back at the office! Man, what a cheapskate!"

Stan laughed and Seheira couldn't help but chuckle a little also.

"All right smart asses!" Malcolm shot back in good-natured humour. "That's enough character assassination! Don't we have work to do?"

"Yeah boss, you have the truth of it," Stan said. "How do we play it?"

"We play it exactly as Lara's instructions say," Malcolm replied. "You and I wait out here Stan. Seheira goes in first and checks the place for Lara's personal items, stashing anything away from prying eyes she sees fit." He looked at Seheira. "Lara's vault was opened, make sure you check inside and set it right as best you can, it'll be a mess in there after the explosion. Then set the security code on the door, locking it until Lara returns." He then handed her a leaf of paper and a small handheld radio. "Here's a map of the place, it's bigger than it looks and I suggest you check every room. Call us with the radio if anything happens or you get lost in there."

"This will take me a while, won't it?" She said to the both of them while looking over the map. "Lucky I didn't have anything planned for the rest of today, or tonight for that matter."

"We'll let your date know you're perusing a mansion tonight," Stan said with another grin. "That should keep him guessing."

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**T**he Croft Mansion was a sophisticated, elderly building filled with polished stone floors and woodwork carved to perfection by carpenters long past. Other wooden floors seemed to greet visitors with their own language of pressure-induced groans as they stepped across the polished boards. Many rooms were empty, save for unused antique furniture that stood enshrouded under white sheets keeping dust from invading the intricate design work. Many were dark with curtains drawn fully closed, some letting only thin shafts of light penetrate where two sections joined, airborne dust swirling visibly in the light.

Seheira worked systematically, checking each room in the mansion and mentally checking it off the map she held in her hands. She quickly found that most of the Mansion was untouched by the intruders. Working through the entire upper floors she found nothing of note, no upset furniture, no windows disturbed, no doors forced open.

The wood panelled corridor Seheira now traversed featured intricate tapestries and paintings of a bygone era. Still barefooted, her feet luxuriated in the soft carpet running up the centre of the floor, leaving only thin strips of polished wooden flooring at each side. Ahead was an open window, allowing the afternoon sun to stream inside and create a skewed rectangle on the floor. Seheira stopped and revelled in the warming glow of the spot. In truth, she had no idea what it was that Lara expected her to set right. The instructions struck her as cryptic, but nonetheless spoke of an intent that Lara wished carried out, obviously with a need to keep something unspoken.

The view from the window was serene. Beech trees swayed in the breeze amongst finely crafted hedges of all shapes, their leaves lush and brilliant green in the clear light of day. A network of limestone paths wound their way through the tranquility and Seheira couldn't help but wonder where each one went; their mystery seeming to add to her own predicament. She pondered, and momentarily became lost in the scene before her.

"Quite an aspect isn't it?"

Seheira jolted from her immersed thoughts with a start and whipped around like a cat to face the voice from the shadows at the end of the corridor.

"Who are…?" She couldn't finish the challenge before the voice came again.

"Don't be alarmed, I shouldn't be here but we share a similar purpose."

Seheira's eye's had adjusted to the sunlight outside, and she now found the dim corridor all the more darkened.

"Who are you?" she challenged successfully this time. "Foxhound are watching me you know."

"Yes I know, and they're good men, but I've scrambled the radio link you have with them. I can't afford them interfering, for now."

The voice was controlled, calm, and calculating, but did not seem to hold menace. Yet Seheira could not trust it. "Look, none of this has anything to do with me," she stated firmly. "Whatever you want, I can't help you with it."

"You can help," the voice replied with a notable British accent. "In fact, when Lara returns she _will_ need your help."

"Look just leave me…"

"What do you know about King Midas?" the voice asked.

"What?" Seheira shot back confused, her eyes still fighting to make out the figure standing at the end of the corridor.

"King Midas," the voice stated again. "What do you know about him?"

Seheira was confused by this odd question from a stranger. "King Midas... It's a fairytale about a king turning everything to gold. What's that got to do with anything?"

"What if I told you that Midas was a real person. What if I told you that a statue in his likeness exists, and holds the power to turn anything to gold, even to this very day."

"Then I'd say you were a delusional lunatic who needs serious help." Seheira replied somewhat incredulous.

The voice chuckled softly. "A good answer Ms Sahain, I see our intelligence about you is accurate. Consider though, that folktales are often built upon a small shred of actual truth." It paused a moment before continuing. "Six years ago, Lara Croft was sifting through the archaeological site at the ancient city of Pessinus, which is the modern day village of Ballihisar in present-day Turkey. The site had long been thought by the best minds in the business to hold no further secrets, but Lara uncovered an extremely well concealed doorway there leading to an extensive underground palace. And I _mean_ extensive. What she found underneath the ruins of Pessinus beggars belief, I myself could not believe it until I saw the place with my own eyes. The palace had been richly built, but also included deadly booby traps throughout the entire complex; we lost eight men exploring the entire area. Eventually, we asked for Lara Croft's help to fully explore the palace. She was the only one who could move about in there without killing herself.

After weeks of exploration, Lara gained access to an inner sanctum, and found a large stone statue surrounded by an odd assortment of gold objects. We quickly found that anything touching the statue turned to pure gold, including one of our agents who merely brushed past it. Laid to rest in an intricate stone coffin beside the statue, we also found the pure gold statue of a young girl, so detailed, and so correctly proportioned that it almost seemed real. We had some gold pieces from that chamber assayed upon our return to Britian, and found them to be pure 24 carat gold.

This is only one of several unbelievable places Lara has found. We had to move quickly and seal the palace again to keep it from public knowledge. The world is not ready for Midas' palace to be uncovered, not yet; the effect on the gold market alone would be catastrophic. There are forces at play down there that we cannot even begin to understand, or even seem possible. Yet they do exist.

Lara has a special gift Ms Sahain. She moves through places that are deadly to anyone else on this Earth. Anyone, who's anyone, knows it as well. Without her we are floundering in the dark, and we cannot afford to let that happen. Now, she's found something… But I can't say any more. Already I must trust you to never speak of Midas' palace to anyone, or else there will be consequences for human kind. I know I'm asking a lot, but I need to know I can trust you."

Seheira stood fixed to the spot, her slim body bathed in the glow from the window. The figure's voice was hard to read she thought. Was it telling the truth? Or was this an intricate plot to use her in some underhanded scheme?

"That works both ways," she replied carefully, absently combing fingers through her hair in thought. "I cannot believe you without something more. How can _I_ trust _you_?"

"Yes, beautiful _and_ intelligent," the voice stated, as if reading from a file. "I work for the British government, although officially I do not exist. You must talk with Lara Croft when she returns from Bolivia and ask her about King Midas, only then will you know what I've told you is true."

"Are you MI6 or something? I don't even know what you look like, standing in the shadows like that."

Seheira could swear the figure smiled. "Not MI6 Ms Sahain but a good guess. I cannot stay any longer. Please make sure you lock Lara's treasure room before you leave, there are things in there even I had no idea she had. They must be kept from prying eyes, I suspect that is why she's asked that only selected people be allowed in to her home. She doesn't trust anyone else, which is good, because neither do I."

The figure began to leave though a doorway next to where it stood.

"Wait!" Seheira said loudly. "At least tell me your name!"

"Please call me David," the voice replied, stopping only briefly before disappearing through the doorway.

"But I don't understand!"

"You will," she heard the voice reply calmly from a distance, echoing slightly as it reached her.

"But..."

Seheira ran to the shadowed doorway no more than ten meters away and peered through it. She saw nothing. Bolting, she ran down the adjoining corridor and peered down a wooden spiral staircase at the end, her aquamarine eyes searching for the mysterious figure; a man, youngish sounding, British, maybe not quite 6 feet tall. But there was no trace of him, vanished into another of the many shadows filling the Croft Mansion. Her body tingled with adrenalin at the unnerving experience just encountered. Was the man real? A ghost? She didn't know.

Sometime later, Seheira emerged into the golden-yellow afternoon sunlight back at the entrance to the mansion. The treasure room had been a mess and had taken her some time to set right again. 'David' had been right, there were strange artefacts in there she'd not wanted to touch or hold any longer than necessary. She'd simply collected broken pieces together and set toppled items back on shelves again. There was nothing she could do about the wall that had been blasted with explosive however; she could only wonder what treasure had been concealed there.

She was tired, and stretched in the cool embrace of the afternoon breeze. Muscles flexed, easily revealed and defined though her halter-top as she tried to ease the days collected strains from her body. Eventually, she sat on the steps to rethink what had occurred that day. The police van was still there, though the forensics team were clearly packing up for the day. She absently began combing her hair again with long thoughtful strokes of her fine fingers, replaying things in her mind, trying to make sense of it all. Stan and Malcom had seen her and were walking over brandishing a thermos and some travel mugs. The sleek metallic-blue Jaguar however, was gone.

Stan and Malcom's smiles were a welcome sight as they approached, saying something about fine cups of British tea. Seheira grinned at them both, relieved at the momentary intermission from the drastic events that had found her that day. Before they reached her, she found herself wondering what Lara Croft could possibly be doing in the jungles and rugged peaks of Bolivia.


	4. Entanglement

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**Phew. This chapter was a journey, no doubt! How can you agonize over the wording in a single paragraph for an entire night? Truly, I have no idea, but that's what happened on more than one occasion. If you want the truth, the chapter I originally envisioned is only half done. But we're talking 12,000 words right here so I thought about splitting the storyline to make this chapter less of a behemoth. I already see how this might benefit, because there's other threads to all of this I still need to get started. So maybe another CHII length chapter to follow this one, and I will be getting back to those characters in a bit. But Lara is only part way through her current storyline, yeah I know, 12,000 words and still she's not done! So I feel another lengthy chapter will be required to solidify the storyline she is currently working through. That should hopefully begin to put some important storyline elements in place for you. I suppose I'd better figure it myself first... decisions decisions.**

**So here's Lara for you all. She _is_ the reason you're here right?**

**I've read through this so many times I think I've memorized it completely. As always, there's parts I'll reword and rewrite over time. But apologies for any jarring errors you find. I am, in fact, human... :)  
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**UPDATES  
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** 31 Jan 2010: Hmph! Well I took a break from this and then came back to re-read it. It grated. *Sigh* Gotta fix it! I've put a marker in so you can tell how far the re-write goes.**

**14 Feb 2010: Rewrite on hold for now. Chapter IV started making a noise inside my head! I've left the re-write marker in place though.**

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**Entanglement**

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**Below the Rainforest of Bolivia.  
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**T**he air tasted earthy and held tantalizing hints of passageways lain undisturbed in silence for centuries long past. Quietly it drifted, as the harbinger of discovery, over a sodden human form at rest in the shallows of a long forgotten subterranean river. A waterfall thundered nearby. Enraged torrents crashed into the otherwise stilled pool where the resting figure lay, sending circular ripples questing across its surface in ever widening exploratory arcs. Mist rose into the air from the boiling maelstrom, shaped by the wiles of unseen air currents as they played in the void and drifted high up into the cavern, disappearing eventually amid deep shadow. Moisture clung to the cavern walls, causing them to sheen in the softly glowing daylight filtering down from the rocky crags and crevices high above, bringing with it a reminder of the sunlit world outside.

Slowly, but with deliberate poise, the sodden feminine form rolled onto her side and surveyed the cavern with intense malachite-green eyes that scanned and sifted through every detail with rigorous precision. Alert, and mind active, she quietly manoeuvred to a kneeling position, causing only the slightest noise as her limbs shifted through the surrounding crystal-clear water. Her right shoulder was grazed, and bled slightly from the upper arm amid the tatters of her short grey shirtsleeve; her earlier collision with the river tunnel wall being responsible for the injury. She sensed no danger, for the moment, but her crystalline thoughts still held warning of the persistent pursuer who'd shadowed her most of that day, though never yet choosing to confront her.

Lara stood; creating miniature rivers that cascaded down her toned, bare midriff, before fattening into beads that raced each other as they trailed down her long legs and back into their watery home. She stepped through the ankle deep water to a small ledge forming the boundary of the subterranean pool and hopped free to the dry, and flat stone ledge containing her backpack; flung there earlier in exhaustion after her journey over the waterfall. Leaning her dripping head back, she vigorously shook it from side to side to scatter the collected river water away, causing a shower of droplets to fly around her like a swarm of buzzing insects. Her long ponytail however, stubbornly remained sodden. Lara reached for it with both hands, then pulled it through her balled right fist to purge the excess moisture from the lustrous strands and smooth it out at the same time. Lara had a love affair with her long ponytail; it was her constant companion and had become an integral part of who she was, so be damned with anyone who didn't like it. She'd even had thoughts of growing it a little longer, just for fun. Life's little pleasures needed taking wherever she could find them, difficult in her profession sometimes.

Lara's Heckler and Koch USP pistols sat waiting for their owner atop her backpack. She reached for the belt-holstered weapons and buckled them in place over her short-length army green shorts, then secured each leg strap in place also. Designed to keep the holstered weapons from flailing all over the place, the leg straps also made quite a fashion statement.

She removed her right-hand gun from its quick-release holster and pulled the stainless-steel-reinforced polymer clip, which held fifteen 9-millimetre rounds. The polymer frame construction of the Heckler and Koch USP made them an extremely rugged firearm; even the steel slide atop the weapon was coated with a high tech nitride finish, providing excellent protection against hostile environments. Lara pulled the slide back, causing the chambered bullet to eject. Expecting it, she caught the bronze-cased projectile midair in a well-practiced grab, and then inspected the firing chamber for embedded debris that could possibly cause a misfire. Her pistols had saved her life many times, so she took every precaution to keep them operating, and ready for the burdens of defence. She scrutinised the weapon a moment longer, her eyes intently searching, then, satisfied, she reloaded the recently ejected round into the polymer clip and slid it home. Again, Lara pulled the steel slide back to chamber a bullet. Danger always lurked in places like this.

The left-hand gun received the same treatment. Lara then shouldered her backpack and set about checking the rest of her equipment. In particular, she checked her Globalstar satellite phone, waterproof thank God, and then her handheld GPS, also waterproof. Both devices powered up as expected and appeared operational, although the GPS could not gain a lock on any satellites, the solid expanse of rock above blocking any signals attempting passage.

The cavern was massive, larger than any cathedral Lara had yet seen. Somehow though, it seemed fashioned. Although rocky and angular, its walls seemed to follow a regular shape, as if a massive blimp had been buried and solid rock then formed all about it. She took explorative steps away from the pool; the crashing sounds of the waterfall becoming oddly muted as she did so, as if the noise was being channeled away to dissipate throughout the massive space.

Parts of the cavern were in shadow while others appeared bathed in a muted sunlight; a patchwork of illuminated areas spread throughout the expanse as if dappled blankets had been draped over the rocky walls and boulder-strewn ground at odd intervals. Lara couldn't discern exactly where the sunlight entered, but could see sunlit alcoves high up amongst the cemented boulders of the cavern roof. Clearly there was access to the outside world from up there, she reasoned, a tantalizing thought considering she'd travelled quite a way _downwards_ through the river tunnel to get here.

Walking with confident strides Lara ventured deeper into the cavern, leaving the underground river behind her. Her hiking boots crunched on the damp, grit-covered stones as she ventured deeper, passing through mottled shadows and voids of darkness as she went. Ever the wary explorer, Lara reached for a pocket built into the side of her backpack and produced a compact LED Lenser tactical torch. At nearly 170 lumens it packed a fair punch, thanks to recent advances in LED light technology. Yet it fit easily into the grip of her hand.

The crisp white light from the torch cut into the dark voids before her with ease, creating small gyrating shadows as the beam played over the rock-strewn ground with explorative sweeps. Lara's gaze followed the light with purposeful intent, watching for, and mentally noting hazards as they appeared. Each time she came upon a sunlit area she flicked the light off to conserve battery power; though the little torch was good for 200 hours on a single set of batteries, she had no idea how long she might be exploring underground. Lara knew her situation could easily turn for the worst, and if it did, a little precaution now might well be the difference between making it out alive or becoming lost forever in a well of darkness.

Lara continued this way for some time, sidestepping potholes, and avoiding ankle rolls on the smallish angular rocks strewn over the sand-grit floor.

She entered one of many areas filled with deep shadow, and clicked the LED Lenser to life. As she swept the beam, her perceptive awareness froze her mid-movement.

Something…

Lara stepped to the spot without further thought and knelt down, shining the torch on the ground at close quarters to examine it. She brushed the small rounded pebbles and accumulated quartz-like grit from the area with a gloved hand, and tossed some larger rocks aside. Once a small area had been cleared she stopped, and frowned with intent thought. Standing slowly, eyes riveted, her ponytail became lodged over her shoulder and she flicked its long length behind her with a quick hand movement and head-roll. A sly smile appeared.

"Bingo," she said slowly to herself, studying the spot attentively. "Lara one, cavern _zilch_."

Amongst the moist mix of quartz sand grains and dark granite pebbles, Lara was looking at three loosely arranged, yet perfectly square black paving stones. No doubt existed in her mind that human hands had made them, their perfect symmetry contrasting starkly with the sandy material infilling the spaces between them. The path they constructed existed now only as a broken shadow of once complete glory, but enough remained to hint of a human presence long since disappeared.

The presence of the paving stones was tantalizing; they were the first solid clue the cavern was more than a simple cave. Lara had suspected this from the first moment her eyes gazed upon the cavern from the shallows of the river pool; this additional evidence only adding shrewdly suspected pieces to a forming puzzle. Something was here. Someone had built _something_ here in ages past, she now knew with solidifying certainty. Ignited full throttle, her innate adventurous spirit now fired with irresistible energy, the paving stones surely meaning the cavern held still more secrets, waiting to be discovered.

Lara continued through the cavern, sweeping the torch beam over the ground ahead of her. Additional paving stones became evident, and more numerous as she made progress along the ancient pathway, lain undiscovered until now. The black stone pavers soon began to take precedence over the surrounding sand and rocks as she continued still further, less were missing, and less were skewed out of alignment in decay. The cavern was still long and cathedral like at this point, it's rocky granite walls uneven as before, yet still displaying the unnatural order that Lara had noticed earlier, as if a grand craftsman had set and shaped its course through the solid bedrock. Ahead, it ran into a sweeping curve with the dark-paved, yet rock-strewn path curving perfectly around the bend and out of sight.

Carefully moderating her progress, eyes ablaze with discovery, torch in hand, Lara traversed the beckoning path before her, sidestepping some larger boulders that had fallen from above in times past. Her calf-high hiking boots clearly sounded against the solid path at her feet, the noise the sum total in the otherwise silent void as she made progress along the curving cathedral pathway. So intent was she at studying the path for hidden traps, that when she eventually thought to look up, her breath escaped her lips in wonderment. She halted, stunned. Her hands shifted to rest against her tight-fitting tactical shorts at her waist as her intense gaze took in the spectacle now opened up before her in a yawing spectacular grandeur.

The cavern ended, but cut into the bedrock wall was an architecturally stunning façade, reminiscent of the highly detailed Gothic cathedrals of Europe. A massive pointed arch sat at the centre of the masterpiece, rounded ribs radiating from a smaller pointed doorway at it its centre. Smaller pointed arches sat to either side of the central one, and were intersected by massive round-ribbed circular columns launching up towards the cavern roof to be capped off with ornate pinnacles that seemed to capture the essence of the surrounding ether. At each end of the façade stood highly decorated square stone towers with flying buttresses, which curved up to connect with a massive stone tower above the central doorway, itself featuring pointed arch windows in a brilliantly ornate grand design. Each of the three towers were topped off with intricately carved circular spires, also reaching majestically towards the cavern roof to join with the pinnacles atop their circular columns. The carvings, without a shadow of a doubt, were the interwoven scrolling snakes Lara had now become familiar with; they seemed to writhe over the architecture in a sliding, interwoven blanket as if to protect it against some unseen force.

Lara stood in quiet awe. The exceptional skill entrained in the stonework before her was beautiful to behold; yet it was a complete enigma. Any archaeological site uncovered from the ancient Incan empire had very distinctive characteristics, including angular temples, simple edifices, and trapezoidal doorways set amongst steeply sloping gable walls; to name but a few. But what appeared before her now had no evidence of Incan design whatsoever, and Lara could not help but grapple with the question of who on earth had built it, and why. Such designs were a very long way from home here, buried as they were, in a lost cave beneath the steaming Bolivian Jungle.

Reluctantly, Lara peeled her gaze from the beautiful façade and again looked at the paving blocks at her feet. Paved roadways _were_ a feature of the Incan empire, but so were they of many other civilisations. Perhaps this came after the fall of the Incan empire, she reasoned. Even if that _was_ the case though, the interwoven snakes were a feature of decidedly _Incan_ structures she'd found up until this point. There was a mystery at play here, Lara felt it with every fibre of her conscious being, reaching out to her and demanding resolution.

She'd dried out somewhat since her immersion in the river. Her grey, figure-hugging top was now considerably less waterlogged, the black stripes running down each side becoming more visible as the moisture departed. Holding hints of the tropical climate aboveground, the cool of the cavern no longer sent her exposed skin to gooseflesh, and Lara felt a comfortable warmth seep back into her body.

Still playing her torch over the remaining pathway where necessary, she continued along it without issue until she reached a set of stone stairs leading up to the doorway at the center of the massive pointed central arch. Her flinted-malachite eyes roamed across the exquisite structure, which now towered over her as she stood before it's enormously commanding presence, filled with wonderment. As far as she could tell, the only doorway was the one directly in front of her, but smooth and solid stone blocked her passage and held no hint of a way through. The ancient stairs rose up to a landing no more than five meters from the stone doorway, and Lara began a cautious ascent in its overpowering presence.

As before, mottled sunlight fell across the façade, throwing some pieces in to noticeable relief, while hiding others in dark mystery. Darkened alcoves and pointed-arch windows seemed to cling to their blackness, as if unwilling to reveal what was hidden in their gathered shadows. The carvings however, seemed alive as they bathed in the filtered light falling across the highly detailed carvings in the stone. Lara willed herself into a years-developed alertness, borne from the many tombs and temples explored in her life thus far. The beam from the torch searched the shadows as she stepped higher, daring something to occur, yet willing it not to. The immaculate skills required to craft such beautiful stonework, she knew, could also be turned to…

A noise. Soft, yet laced with menaced intent. Again. And… Again.

Lara's crystalline subconscious screamed at her sixth sense of danger and mercilessly took control of her body, dropping her to the dust covered steps within heartbeats and flattening out her body in an evasive manoeuvre that almost appeared impossible to manifest. Deadly poison darts, carrying certain agonising death whistled overhead where her body had been mere moments before, the soft thrumming sound of their passage seeming to roar in Lara's ears.

Silence returned, the danger come and gone with lightening speed.

Slowly Lara rolled over onto her front, dropping down to a lower step in the process. Equally as cautious, she picked herself up and knelt exactly where she was, all the while listening for the thrumming to return. It didn't. She studied the steps in front of her and soon picked out a paving block that was slightly lower than the others, but with no other difference in appearance. Crouching down, she reached out and attempted to push it down. A barely audible ceramic click was the result, along with the block falling down a half centimetre at best. Immediately the thrumming death-darts whistled overhead again as Lara looked up at them with flint-edged caution, knowing now that she'd need all her skill to progress any further. The stone paving block then rose again to reset the trap. Cunning, she thought. _Very _cunning.

Standing, Lara spied three more slightly depressed blocks set into the stairway above her, and gave them a wide berth knowing they meant certain death. Reaching the top of the stairs, she found herself standing before the flat stone-paved landing directly in front of the smooth solid stone doorway. The stonework comprising the façade at this point was built from a yellowish rock, smoothed and crafted with great care until it fit the shape the original stonemasons had desired. She noted an oddity; beside the archway, some meters from the actual door, a smooth grey stone block was set amongst the otherwise yellowish carved building blocks. Lara could see no damage or decay in the area, her initial thoughts being a stone veneer had fallen free of the wall. But each stone face appeared as exquisite as its day of construction, the carved snakes still swirling in precise detail within their earthen world. In addition, there was no broken decay scattered across the landing at _any_ point, a sure sign the facade had stood the test of time with resolute strength. The smooth grey panel obviously had some purpose, although considering the traps just uncovered, Lara was wary.

She explored the remainder of the façade and found it truly fascinating. No other traps lay embedded in the area and Lara was able to explore it freely. She ran her gloved hands over the crafted stonework and became filled with an admiring appreciation of the unknown people who'd toiled here with such precision to shape the masterwork. Accumulated dust billowed out from her hands as she did so, coating her forearms slightly with each loving caress. It was extremely fine work and Lara knew its equal would be difficult to find, which saddened her somewhat, knowing that she may be the only one to gaze upon its splendour both now, and long into the future.

Although intriguing, the remainder of the façade held no clue as to how passage through the door was gained, and Lara soon found herself standing before the grey stone panel, around a meter square, set into the wall beside the central arch. There were no markings evident on it's plain surface whatsoever, though her sixth sense strongly suspected a hidden purpose. Lara shoved it and immediately stood back, testing it for attached internal mechanics.

Nothing.

She scrutinised the bas-relief carvings immediately adjoining the grey stone panel.

Nothing.

She stepped forward to…

_Clank!_

Lara jumped back at the sound with gazelle-like agility, fully expecting a hail of darts to strip the flesh from her body, or a heavy stone to fall from above squashing the life out her in mere seconds. She looked around in a lightening reflexive survey, almost convinced another clandestine trap had been sprung.

Silence. Although…

Had the block moved? She couldn't be certain, yet something appeared different about it. She scrutinised it again for the umpteenth time.

"Come on Lara!" she said slowly as she scanned, willing herself to discover the secret.

The mortar surrounding the block had been disturbed, a fine crack now ran around its entire perimeter, as if a miniature earthquake had rattled the entire wall. But what the devil had caused it to move? She stepped forward again to replay the events of moments before.

Clank!

This time she held her nerve with an iron grip that compelled her not to jump away. Something was happening within the wall, as if large stone gears were moving for the first time in centuries and voicing complaint at their sudden jolt from slumber. Dust billowed and fell from the grey stone as it jolted suddenly, amid the sounds of grinding stone gears. Delicately, it receded into the wall a short way, scrutinised every inch by a flinted malachite stare, then, with soft finesse, it began moving upward into a cavity hidden behind the stone block above.

Lara watched as the stone moved, half crouching in readiness should danger suddenly spring forth from the opening gap. The stone moved higher and Lara noted carvings behind it, their intricate designs becoming bathed in light for the first time in centuries as the stone continued upward. Again she looked around in rapid assessment, ponytail shivering with each movement, still not entirely convinced this wasn't a trap of pure cunning design.

Nothing else appeared to be happening, but still she remained vigilant as the stone completely disappeared up into the wall and all noise ceased with another clanking sound of finality. After a moments silence, Lara looked down and saw the well-hidden pressure stone her right boot had caught with its toe. Very thin, it came up only a small way from the stone pavers surrounding it and had been all but invisible from further away. It was craftily designed, and Lara knew that only blind luck had allowed her to find it so quickly, though she knew she'd have discovered it eventually.

Turning her gaze to the carved stones within the cavity, Lara was suddenly hit with a wave of utter disbelief as she examined them properly for the first time. She frowned and shook her head in mistrust, while stepping back as if the stones were coated in a deadly poison.

"_What?"_ It escaped her exasperated lips in the throes of utter confusion.

She stared at the neatly carved stones, square in shape, each the size of a man's opened hand. Her mind rejected the images fed to it from her exquisite green eyes; it wasn't possible! Unless… This was all some kind of sick joke. But that didn't fit either; nobody had been here in a _very_ long time. Her head still slowly shook, as if denying an accusation thrown at her containing evil portents.

"_Just_… _What?_"

She stepped forward and reached out to touch the stones, sitting facing her innocently from within the cavity. She stopped short though, and again stood back closing her eyes, trying to make sense of what she saw. _Now I've seen everything,_ she thought.

She'd seen the designs before, almost every day of her life in fact, as had many people living in the modern world. For the neatly arranged stones formed a modern numeric keypad, highly typical of any mobile phone or compact handheld device. The pound symbol was there as was the hash and asterisk, along with the numbers one through 9, and zero appearing at the bottom below the eight. Just like a mobile phone. This place was ancient, she was absolutely certain, the Gothic architecture a paradox in itself. But a modern numeric keypad? The builders of this place _could not_ have known about current day symbols or keypad layouts. So what in damn hell was going on?

Lara needed to pause and think. She unhooked her backpack and set it down beside her, then planted her feet before the keypad to make her stance comfortable. She reached up and loosened the hair band holding her ponytail in place, then pulled its entire length through and free of the constrictive, material-covered band. Her long and lustrous dark brown mane fell full length to lick at the top of her shorts and fan over her back in a rich celebration of deep colour. She moved her head back slightly and shook it to aid the long tresses in settling, then focussed her gaze once again on the keypad as she slipped the hair band over her left wrist for safe keeping.

Now past the fact the stone keypad should not exist, she turned her attention to the combination it was obviously waiting for. But what was it? Where would she find it? She knelt, becoming cocooned within her long tresses, and retrieved her Globalstar satellite phone from within her backpack. She stood again, her fringe sliding down past her face and onward to meet with the smooth skin of her midriff, and her holstered pistols waiting in readiness. She thought, brows knitted, eyes flicking between the glowing keypad in her hands and the vastly more ancient version in the wall cavity before her.

Once again, her breath rushed from her lips as further recognition dawned; stunning her once more into utter disbelief. She tossed the Globalstar down to land softly atop her backpack, head again slowly shaking as she tried to deny what was in plain evidence before her eyes. The stone keypad had the same layout as her Globalstar, its top four buttons larger in size, with the central corner cut from each so that a fifth button could fit in their centre. Manufactured in 2009. Long breaths came seeking calm as she sought sense, fast falling from her grasp amidst a bizarre array of impossibilities.

She flicked the entirety of her hair forward, bending over so that it fell in front of her in a syrup-textured mahogany waterfall. She hung there a moment, smelling the subterranean river water intermingled with the jasmine shampoo she used the night before, and also sparking a thought as to exactly what the code to the stone keypad might be. She straightened in a long-practiced motion of rapidly fluid grace and form, her hair now arcing over her head and coming to rest down her back, again with a shake of her head to aid settlement. Her mind worked. Lara parted her her hair equally three ways and began to expertly fashion a long braid, her hands moving in honed, precise movements, all the while staring at the stone keypad with thought provoking intent. Half way through the task, she bought the forming braid over her shoulder to continue the fashion work, never looking, her mind knew by instinct how it would end up. She slipped her black hair band over the completed artwork, having left a small length free at the end, just for fun. She flicked the completed braid around her shoulder so that it now hung down her back, not quite able to reach her shorts this time, the braiding having used some of its length.

Lara brushed the sticking dust from her legs, shorts, and the exposed small of her back, having collected it as she'd dropped to the floor to avoid the death darts earlier. She then picked up her backpack once more, slipping the Globalstar into its pocket, and shouldered into the straps, adjusting them until comfortable. Then she stepped up to the stone keypad and rolled the dice.

Her Globalstar had an access code, a six-digit number that needed to be punched in before the phone became active and able to make calls. As daft as it seemed, and with the way things were going, Lara had thought to try her Globalstar's access code on the stone keypad. _It was worth a shot wasn't it?_ She thought to herself.

The stone felt somewhat warm to the touch as she pressed the first key, five. It depressed easily, as if sprung from behind, immediately causing a commotion from inside the wall as the stone gears within its depth again rumbled to life and turned to some clandestine formula.

Then it went silent.

Her fingertips moved to the next key in her code, eight. Again the stone gears rumbled as she pushed the stone, and again it went silent shortly afterward. She continued with this process until she came to the sixth number in the code, zero. The cogs turned and again silence was the result. She stepped back and waited.

Nothing happened.

"What's your next brilliant idea Lara?" She asked herself in deflated tones.

She had no other ideas. Her only option now was to thoroughly search the cavern and façade in the hopes of discovering the code hidden as cleverly as the keypad pressure stone had been. Unless…

She stepped forward and pressed the button usually assigned the 'ok' function when navigating through the menus on the Globalstar. Once again the stone cogs turned in their mysterious dance behind the wall, a little longer this time, but still their movement ceased to silence after a time.

Lara waited.

Nothing happened.

She turned to begin her search of the cavern, positive there must more clues yet to discover. She reasoned it really _was_ a little fanciful to think that someone living hundreds of years past would actually know the combination to her blue 2009 model Globalstar satellite phone. The word 'impossible' again swept through her mind as she again tried to fit reasoned thought into all that had occurred so far, but again it slipped her grasp. Sighing, she began her descent of the stairs and turned her thoughts toward where to begin searching for…

_Clank!_

Lara stopped dead, frozen to the spot. It couldn't be! Could it? Huge stone gears shifted yet again, seeming to have enmeshed others in a louder, more insistent crescendo of movent. She could feel vibrations through the stone on which she stood, reverberating through the solid earth as the cogs turned, their mission, only God knew. Whipping around to face the archway, Lara saw the great stone portal shudder, sending stone chips flying and dust billowing out in great swirling clouds of disturbance.

"Oh you _have_ to be kidding me!" Lara breathed amid the mechanical clamour.

Slowly, but with colossal force, the stone blocking the doorway began to rise with a smooth precision that belied its massive size. The protesting mechanics continued to turn, forcing the stone ever higher until it reached the point of the inner most rib decorating the massive archway, somewhere just past Lara's head height. An earthen thud followed and the massive inner workings of the doorway finally rested, their monumental task now complete.

Lara could not believe her eyes. Her Globalstar's access code had opened the door. Impossible, yet, the truth.

Darkness filled the void beyond, and Lara once more clicked her LED Lenser into life before stepping through the threshold and into the unknown.

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**A**n old man of impossible years sat ensconced in a leather-bound office chair on the top floor of a modern high-rise building, and gazed out over the Potomac River in Rosslyn, Virginia. The high-rise, which belonged to him in it's entirety, also sat directly across the Potomac from Washington DC and offered commanding views of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, now busily loaded with hustling traffic. Small pleasure boats made steady progress along the waterway, easily navigating beneath the bridge, which spanned the river with great domed-concrete archways. Square concrete columns rose up from each dome-span at regular intervals to support the substantial weight of the bustling roadway above. Smaller domes spanned each gap between the square columns as they met the underside of the roadway, and almost made the bridge appear to have church windows, the only thing missing being the stained glass. The traffic moved slowly, yet with profound impatience. People were always in a rush to be someplace else the man thought, and never stopped to take pleasure in where they were at the moment.

His grey hair fell to his shoulders, and he wore an Inca styled tunic adorned with Inca styled motifs, set in a checkerboard pattern over the entire garment. The office contained little clutter, having only a small number of stone statues furbishing the room to join with the rough-hewn stone-built desk at which the man sat. Of note also, was a huge polished mahogany bookshelf filling the entire wall behind the man, its shelves filled with countless texts and volumes that contained a vast array of collected knowledge. A flatpanel LCD computer screen sat atop the polished surface of the stone desk, along with a small number of documents neatly arranged in a single pile. No keyboard or mouse were in evidence.

The man gave a simple hand wave, as if brushing away a ponderous insect, causing a large screen to slowly descend from the ceiling a short distance in front of the desk. Another hand motion, a little different from the first, and the floor-to-ceiling glass windows offering views of the Potomac darkened, as if by magic, cutting the light coming through them by a third. He then produced a laser pointer from a drawer in the desk, and aimed its thin red beam onto the display screen. The moment he did so, it came to life and displayed a black background workspace with a small number of icons arranged arbitrarily across it. The laser point drifted over one of the icons and a highly detailed photograph appeared, the man eased back and studied it silently, as if willing it to divulge more information than was really there.

An old historic document lit the small flatpanel on the desk as the man flicked the laser over a set of toolbars on the larger screen; it appeared to be a photograph of a very old text opened to a page showing a drawing of a human figure with mountain peaks in the background. Another movement of the laser pointer changed the flatpanel image to a photographed bas-relief carving which detailed a female figure standing before the façade of an exquisite Gothic cathedral.

**[ Limit of Rewrite so far :) - 24th Feb 2010 - ]**

"Thonapa?" a quiet voice spoke from the end of the desk. "You seem troubled."

A woman, of a similar age to the man, had quietly entered the room and come to the side of his desk, her footfalls muffled by the sheepskin boots she wore. Her ankle length one-piece dress was also styled Inca fashion, featuring a lengthy ornamental sash that bound her waist and material that featured motifs similar to those present on the mans garment.

"Chasca," the old man replied softly. "I am worried by this," he motioned to the image on the large screen, "It means everything is not as we thought."

"Who is she?" Chasca asked, peering over towards the image on the drop-down screen.

The image in question was a photograph of a young woman; caught mid-stride as she descended the steps in front of what appeared to be the entrance to a grand cathedral. The woman appeared strong of character, her willpower seeming to radiate from the photograph as both the man and woman studied it. Yet her attire and long braid revealed a feminine refinement, which seemed at odds with everything else about her.

"Her name is Lara Croft," Thonapa replied with considered speech. "Certain groups are calling people in her profession 'Tomb Raiders', though I feel that is overstating matters somewhat in her case." He added, nodding toward the screen.

"An amateur explorer?" Chasca queried.

"No. She's no amateur. She has quite a list of discoveries, speaks 12 different languages, can read Egyptian hieroglyphs, and has knowledge of pictographic artworks of other ancient peoples also. She is young, but her life has been far from ordinary. The Majestic Twelve have a file on her, as do MI6."

"Interesting. Does she sell artefacts on the black market? I mean… What is the point of this – 'Tomb Raiding'?"

"Others do take things to sell on the black market for money, but Ms Croft does not seem to," Thonapa replied. "She's heavily involved with the British Museum, and is responsible for a great number of artefacts on display there. It seems she only keeps a small number of pieces for her own enjoyment, though MI6 seem to think that even those will be gifted to the Museum in due time."

"She isn't in it for the money then?"

"No, something else drives her. Her wealth is estimated in the billions but she keeps it invested in such a way that her holdings are always under the radar. She also has quite significant gold holdings held in a Swiss bank, so I doubt she needs any extra money."

Chasca turned to look at him. "She sounds dangerous Thonapa, and she's nosing around our homeland. Is that why you are worried? Surely Tezra can do what must be done to preserve the secrets of our people?"

"We've lost a lot of the knowledge our people once had as you know," Thonapa replied, somewhat troubled. "This photograph was taken inside a cave in the Anchotuma valley, an area we've thought had no significance, until now."

"The cathedral was right under our noses the whole time?" Chasca queried, incredulous.

"Yes it appears so. The depictions we had of it only showed us the designs of the façade, and we have always assumed it was an actual cathedral, located somewhere in Europe due to it's clearly gothic lines. Never did we guess that a façade was _all _it was, and that we'd find it closer to home, underground in a cave no less. Dangerous or not, Ms Croft has found it within our own homeland, where even _we_ could not."

Chasca could see that Thonapa thought of his inability to find the 'cathedral' as a failure, and that it was another weight added to his old shoulders he didn't need. Already they had both lived too long, and she could see the worry of safeguarding their peoples knowledge begin to weigh heavily on Thonapa, his slate grey eyes betraying a deep-rooted disquiet. They should have been long rested by now, but with the aid of technology, they persisted. They had to. William Cortez had murdered all but one of their children, and their remaining son walked a dangerous path.

"The Tiwanku carvings," Chasca said after a moment, nodding toward the image displaying on the smaller flatpanel. "You think this 'Lara Croft' might be the woman our ancestors saw in their visions of the future?"

Thonapa looked up into the ancient eyes of his wife. "It is possible." He leaned forward amid the soft cracking sounds of fine, plush leather and stood with an ease that defied his years. "I always assumed that she," he nodded toward the woman in the carving, "would be one of us. An Inca, perhaps even -," he paused, suddenly not wanting to speak. "Perhaps even one of our daughters but…" the sentence died on his lips, the memories too painful.

"Our own daughters are laid to rest," Chasca finished for him. She stepped close to him, took up his withered hands and said "They watch over us through the veil of the afterlife, always watching, always protecting, and always empowering us. They are at peace Thonapa, you know this." She looked into his slate grey eyes.

Thonapa squeezed his wife's hands then let them go and walked to the window, and again gazed out over the Potomac through the darkened windows. Softly he said, "_I_ should be the spirit watching over _them_! Is my fate so important that I should be left to walk the Earth long after they have passed? The evil of Cortez _must_ end, or we are lost, along with humanity, and our daughters died for nothing."

Chasca moved to join Thonapa at the window, stepping near-silently with softly padded footfalls. She came to a stop beside him, "Our time has not yet come Thonapa, but if Lara Croft _is_ the woman foretold in the carvings then our journey to the afterlife may yet appear on the distant horizon."

"Tezra is doing a good job following her," Thonapa replied. " If she has evil in her heart then he will uncover it."

"You don't think she _is_ evil though do you?" Chasca asked, gazing at the wind ruffled trees far below on the banks of the river.

Thonapa turned back to gaze at the large image of Lara standing in front of the gothic façade. Softly, but with conviction he said, "No, she is not evil. I think she _is_ the woman depicted in the Tiwanku carvings. But," he paused, thinking, "I need to be certain."

Thonapa himself had discovered the bas-relief carvings from Tiwanku in 1894 after tantalizing clues from other sites had hinted that something of extreme importance was buried beneath the ancient city there. The modern world considered the ancient city an enigma, as much of Tiwanaku's construction defied the laws of physics and mathematics, even by today's standards. Baffling, was the fact that many monuments there shared a close resemblance to those created by other ancient cultures all over the planet. But to Thonapa and his people it all made perfect sense, and they would live there again if given the chance.

The carvings had been unearthed in a solidly built chamber far below the ground level of the ancient place. Barely discernable, Thonapa had uncovered the chambers entrance after locating the remains of a particular courtyard, which had once been part of a temple devoted to studying the cosmos. Buried under meters of rubble and deposited soil, it had taken all his skills to find the location, however, he'd always had the deep feeling that the chamber had been meant for him.

After removing paving stones of a particular rock type, a small square entrance had been revealed which lead some 200 meters down to a small cube shaped chamber, exquisitely adorned with amazing carved images. Incredibly, the stone carvings had clearly been designed for easy removal, locked in place with ingenious stone pegs that were made to be broken, freeing the stone carvings from the wall. A small panel had even depicted a man, chillingly featured like Thonapa, doing exactly that. Somehow, whoever had made the carvings knew their removal would be necessary at some point in the future. Added to that, the carvings depicted scenes that simply did not exist when Tiwanku was a thriving city, the gothic cathedral for one, The Francis Scott Key Bridge another, and a woman holding pistols in another.

Thonapa had bought the carvings to America, and had been stunned when the Key Bridge had been completed in 1923, exactly matching the structure depicted in the stone carvings. He'd immediately moved to buy property in the area, feeling there must be some reason for the improbable events that were occurring. Now this, the unknown woman depicted in the carvings had appeared, as had the 'cathedral'. Was this supposed to be a warning? Was the woman dangerous to their cause? Was she their long-awaited answer? Thonapa simply didn't know.

Chasca followed the wake of an old wooden fishing boat chugging up the Potomac, several seagulls wheeling in circular flightpaths overhead. Without turning from the view she said, "And if it really is her?"

"Then she faces immense danger, as we also do."

Thonapa again waved his hand, certain fingers outstretched in a long-practised signal. Lara disappeared from the drop-down screen and the image became that of another stone carving. A small figure stood before an immense demon that almost held the appearance of a mythic fire-breathing dragon. The small figure was clearly the woman, pistols in hand, fighting the beast; the depiction appeared lethally one-sided however with the woman's death surely imminent. Thonapa sighed, "If only we knew the face of this evil she must face."

Chasca turned from the tranquillity of the river to face the terrible scene depicted in the carving and asked, "William Cortez?"

"Perhaps." Thonapa replied. "But for all his evil malice, could even one such as he produce this carnage?" Thonapa waved his hand, changing the scene to yet another image depicted in stone.

A city burned. Flames reached toward the heavens amid a malevolent hail of fireballs, leaving sickening trails of smoke behind them as they rained death on the modern city. The dragon-beast hovered in the sky to one side, clutching the deceased from of the woman, an evilly dominating grin set on its face through razorblade fangs meant for death and pain. Skyscrapers lay in ruin amid choking smoke and flames as smaller winged beasts clutched broken human forms as they wheeled around the destruction. The Whitehouse lay shattered in one corner; the British house of Parliament lay broken in the other. It was a chilling scene of Armageddon, a possibility, considering the pinpoint accuracy of the other carvings.

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**D**arkness clung to the ancient stonework like a thick syrup refusing to drain away, disappearing only begrudgingly as Lara's LED torch beam momentarily illuminated the surfaces of the intriguing passageway before her. There was no noise, save for that of her own beating heart, and the regular rhythm of her lungs as they fed oxygen to her lithe body. Slowly she ascended stone stairs, examining every surface with the torch beam as she went, her crystalline consciousness missing no detail. This place exuded skilled craftsmanship, meaning deadly danger lay expertly waiting, and she knew it all too well almost feeling the presence of waiting death. The walls were pink stone; likely granite of some kind, expertly smoothed until it became almost impossible to tell where one stone block finished and another began. Tantalizingly, the interwoven and scrolling snake designs had been inlaid into the pink stone within a narrow band using a greenstone, at head height it could not be missed and produced a highly detailed ornamentation along each wall.

The floor and steps were slate grey and equally smoothed with great care, and Lara's hiking boots sounded like tap shoes as she climbed each low step with steadied progress, footfalls echoing slightly with each contact. The roof of the passage sloped upward about a third of the way in from each side, the same pink stone in evidence here as well. The middle third looped up in a perfect semicircle, built of a veined creamy marble that would have been at home amid the towering cathedrals of Europe; it almost seemed alive, as if depicting blood coursing through an alien tissue. The passageway felt airy with room to move; Lara estimated it's overall height around three meters and width around four.

The torchlight glinted against something in the marble ahead as Lara swept the torch beam over the roof in her constant pattern of searching sweeps. Intrigued, she continued to the spot with ever-vigilant steps, and then aimed the torch upward to try and catch a better view of what had caused the reflection. She was astonished.

Spidering through the white marble in haphazard branching tendrils was a deep-blue gem-like material that seemed to spread the torchlight through its entire structure as Lara focussed the light on it. Focussing the LED beam further to a compact spot, Lara noted soft blue glows snaking through the marble and away from her along the curved portion of the ceiling, only disappearing in the blackness of the passageway some distance ahead. The glassine material seemed to glow with it's own deep blue light as the immediate harshness of the torchlight faded inside a short radius around her, it's dendritic path through the marble clearly highlighted by an inner glow. It was a mesmerising effect, resembling the illuminated cosmos in a brilliant night sky. Lara bathed for some moments in the beauty of the lustrous lit shapes, a smile forming as she did so; great danger often hid great beauty, she knew, and it was these little moments she lived for.

With reluctance, she moved the torch beam away and the blue dendritic veins quieted to darkness once more. She stood a moment and refocussed her mind, her senses retuning to her predicament after relaxing at the sight of the blue veined spectacle. She knew she could not afford a single thoughtless move in a place such as this; such caution had kept her alive many times before and she wasn't about to let her standards slip now. She shook her head, almost on autopilot, clearing her mind of irrelevant thoughts and ensuring her braid fell free past her backpack.

Lara continued along the passageway for some time, noting several sets of slightly raised paving stones sporting gently carved snakes twirling around forest vines on their surfaces. She'd noted them immediately as the torchlight shadowed the deeper sections of the lightly carved stone faces, and a closer inspection of the immediate areas around them had indeed revealed small ominous holes drilled through the pink stonewalls. Lara knew without a shadow of a doubt they were deadly traps, built to stop those who might blunder past without care. She could not help but admire the artistry and cunning of those responsible for the traps, almost feeling a connection with them for wanting to protect this strangely beautiful place.

The passageway continued for some time, sometimes with stairs leading up or down, sometimes around ninety degree corners, or sometimes just continuing on a level plane deeper into the bedrock. The same pink stone continued all the way, as did the greenstone inlay. The spidering blue gemstone appeared at various places in the curved marble overhead, always with the same light channelling properties Lara had witnessed earlier. Only in a few small areas had the passageway suffered damage, shifts in the surrounding rock had caused stone blocks to fall from the walls and roof causing inevitable decay, but never enough to hinder her progress. An hour had passed since Lara had entered the passageway from the ornate cathedral façade, and she found herself wondering how much further the passageway could possibly go.

Her thoughts were soon answered as she stepped around yet another corner in the passageway, to be immediately greeted by a new design in the pressure plate traps she'd been seeing all throughout its labyrinthine length. The raised stones now appeared in a chessboard fashion across the entire floor, extending as far as her malachite eyes could discern in the fading limits of the torchlight some distance ahead. Plain uncarved stones were mixed with the trapped and deadly variety that held certain death if activated. Yet the 'safe' stones were too small for her to step upon with any degree of safety, she might do it dancing on tiptoes but the likelihood of error or overbalance at some point made it unthinkable to attempt. Lara sensed strongly that there must be another way.

Lara scanned the walls and roof of the passageway for clues. Nothing presented itself. She moved to the far wall and ran her gloved hand over the smooth pink stone, hoping to find _something_ that might help her get past the traps, but came up empty. There must be a way, she thought. Some way of traversing the trap the original builders had in mind, she only needed to discover what it was.

She looked around the space where she stood, and suddenly noted four square stone blocks neatly arranged in the outer corner of the passageway, one block sitting on top of three others forming a small pyramid shape. Curiosity fired, and she stepped closer to examine them. Each was the size of a double fist, the block on top was carved, those beneath were not. Lara had the impression the blocks had been specifically placed, long ago, and certainly did not appear to be a haphazard or forgotten occurrence. She knelt next to them and bought the LED torch to bear in close quarters, her long braid falling over her shoulder as she did so. There was no pressure plate beneath them, so they did not appear trapped, and Lara knew then they must have some significance in regards to passing the chessboard pressure plates.

Reaching out she lifted the carved stone from the top of the pile, and waited, senses ablaze.

Nothing happened.

She turned to study the chessboard floor once more, stone in hand. She stood, absently caressing an errant itch on uncovered skin at her midriff, and stepped as close to the pressure plates as she dared. Again she knelt, to study the danger, her mind with that one single focus. She tried fitting the block to one of the plain squares, thinking she might be able to stand on top of them as she traversed the trapped area, her feet safely above the danger. It did fit in the spaces, but was a close call. If a block moved while she stood on it with all her weight, the result would not be good.

Lara's malachite gaze narrowed as a thought entered her blazing mind, and she slowly stood, flicking her braid behind her as she extended to full height. She stepped back two paces with adeptly balanced poise, paused a moment, then lobbed the block in a looping throw out into the trapped area, and watched.

Lara followed the flightpath of the block in the torchlight as it looped and spun through the air; it's flying shadow charging down to the limits of illumination like a strange creature sliding across the wall in startled escape. Impact occurred with a resonating stony crash, launching small stone chips on haphazard flightpaths of their own across the ether. Several pressure stones were woken from their centuries-long slumber, and depressed noiselessly as the carved block spun and clattered into them in a brief session of spent energy, before thumping to a sudden stop.

A brief moment passed.

A noise, like two bricks tapping together, sounded up from beneath the floor. Lara's hearbeat lifted its tempo.

_Shoom! Shoom! Shoom!_

Three spikes shot from the holes in the walls immediately adjacent the activated squares, shattering to splinters as they hit the wall opposite with a noise like broken glass. A deadly blur, they flew with enough lightning ferocity to strip flesh from bone like the hellfire from Satan's own gatling gun. The mechanisms clearly still worked, and worked well.

Lara stood without apparent reaction; hardly surprised by the outcome of her little test, though her heartbeat _did_ take it's time quieting, not fully trusting the danger had passed. A knowing smirk appeared across her lips and her eyes shone with crystal certainty as she realised what must be done to pass the traps, silently nodding with chin in hand as she acknowledged the cleverness of the ancient builders.

She began to stretch her athletic limbs, and bounce on the spot to prepare for what she must do. The key giveaway was the momentary pause between activating the pressure plates and the spikes firing from the wall. At a fast sprint, Lara knew she could outrun the shooting spikes, and now felt certain the whole purpose of the stacked square stones in the corner was to do exactly as she had done. Test the trap first.

Although she could not see how far the chessboard trap extended, Lara knew she could not walk away without testing the mettle of the ancient builders, long since passed from this life. They had clearly been master craftsmen, as nothing in evidence so far had even hinted at roughness or slipshod workmanship, added to that, their deadly traps had survived hundreds of years and still worked with well oiled precision, a feat of grand engineering in itself. Lara could not help but admire such gifted workmanship; it ignited a fulfilling passion within her, similar to that of an artist gazing upon the great beauty of the Mona Lisa at the Louvre.

She stilled herself, and focussed her crystalline mind to a single point of clarity, willing herself to rise to the challenge placed before her. She stepped back three more paces and crouched in readiness for take off, all the while focussing her intense gaze on the mortal danger ahead. Her persona became deadly, her aura razor sharp. The Tomb Raider was here to play.

Lara bolted with the speed of a hungry cheetah, bent on chasing expert prey. Her boots hit the first line of pressure plates, which immediately depressed to floor level, but she passed them with increasing speed and was well away before the mechanics responded. Legs pumping with driving speed, Lara sprinted through the pressure plate minefield, her mind noting the brickwork mechanisms clanking beneath the floor and the shattering spikes a brief distance behind her. She held her LED torch left-handed with an iron grip, still needing it to light the dark passageway; if it was lost now, she was dead. Amid the shattering chaos of the splintering spikes, Lara could not say for certain how much of a lead she had on the firing mechanisms activating behind her. She became the wind, driven as if fuelled by a superstorm hurricane.

The passageway continued for some distance before Lara noted a ninety-degree turn. Her mind registered the corner's trapped floorspace as she rushed toward it, driving hard; she knew she'd find no respite there. Lara hit the corner and adjusted her sprinting balance so she could traverse the right-angle turn with as little lost speed as possible, and with gazelle-like agility she did so, then the game changed.

Appearing like darkened hulks in the wildly flailing beam of the torch were a series of low stone walls across the passagway. Lara adjusted the joting light beam as she rocketed, trying to discover what cleverly hidden menace the innocent looking walls might hold. Stone blocks, no mechanisms that she could see, or was…

No time. She was upon the first one.

Lara lifted her legs in a smooth hurdle and cleared the first wall with ease, her short close fitting shorts allowing full and easy movement. Landing with an easy touch, she had no time to study the wall further; the ninety-degree corner having cost some of her precious lead over the shooting spikes. The ancient enclosed space now resonated with perilous chaos as Lara danced with the death machines of the ancient builders. Yet her iron will did not falter, and her inner calm remained a bastion of clarity as she bolted with split second accuracy.

Another wall loomed in the wild LED light. Were there pressure plates on top of it? Lara tried to decipher what her eyes saw in the flailing light. Shadows danced in wild fits and laughing concoctions as she steadied the little torch as much as she could, her sprinting charge making the task all but impossible. The wall was a little higher… _Bloody hell!_

No time. She had to jump or die.

There were small razor sharp spikes protruding from the top of the wall, and Lara adjusted her hurdle on the fly to clear this new threat. She had no illusions, one mistake would cost her life; there was no second chance in the game of life. Her fit legs flexed with exertion as she cleared the spikes and came back to earth in a momentum-fuelled torrent of flight. Lara whipped the LED torch in front of her once more and x-rayed the beam with her brilliantly tuned intelligence, her mind barraged all the way with the shattering sounds of the underworld a short distance behind. Another wall appeared, placed with devious intent; it extended full height to the roofline of the passageway. Once again there were only seconds for decisions.

The chessboard-trapped floor continued to the wall's base.

The wall was solid.

The shooting death-spikes had not stopped.

_Come on Lara_, she willed herself. _You are like the wind._

At the last moment, she noted a low space _underneath_ the full height wall. Pure war-tuned instinct took over and Lara dived into a sideways roll, needing to get down as low as possible to pass through the narrow gap. The split second action meant Lara lost more precious lead-time, as she could not shape the roll properly to keep her momentum at top speed. The tip of her right boot clipped the underside of the wall as she passed beneath it, raising centuries settled dust in vortex driven bursts that pursued the feeling Tomb Raider like revenge-driven spirits.

Lara inwardly cursed her sloppiness.

_You are better than that Lara!_ She encouraged herself.

Extending out of the only slightly wayward roll, Lara fought for her sprinting balance, as she dared not slow a single iota, knowing, feeling, that spike driven annihilation was now perilously close at hand. She was fit, but now felt tiredness beginning to register it's first telltale signs within her consciousness, her dust coated midriff also beginning to flex as her diaphragm worked to compensate for her body's increased demands for oxygen.

Lara's long braid trailed out behind her in animated flight as she again willed herself to agile speed. Her grip on the torch was now sweated with her exertions, making it somewhat slippery in her grasp, but Lara kept in a firm grip knowing full well it was her lifeline out of this subterranean death trap. Again she used it to scan the passageway ahead, ruthlessly, ignoring the subconscious warning of close at hand death that her mind knew was imminent. Her clear green eyes showed now trace of fear at her plight, instead working on scanning the passageway opening out before her as she rocketed along in full throttled evasion.

Yet another wall appeared at the limit of the torch beam, clearly also extending to the passageway roofline.

Lara's legs pumped with tiring swiftness, yet she willed her body to perform.

The wall drew closer within seconds, and Lara could plainly see it was a dead end. A fully trapped dead end with no way through in evidence.

_Come on Lara!_

The torch beam played over the deadly space remaining as Lara manoeuvred it as best she could. Shutting out fatigue and rising warning, she sifted through what she saw ahead in the light, _knowing_ there was an answer, as if some otherworldly presence was pervading her thoughts and hinting from the shadows.

The dead end was moments away, still with no way through presenting itself.

_Come on Lara!_

Something registered at the edges of her perception. A shadow that should not _be_ a shadow was dancing in the light. She grappled the thought into clarity and whipped the torchlight to the roofline with split seconds to spare. She saw her salvation, cleverly, devilously placed, but knew she would be perilously hard pressed to reach it.

No time. She had to jump or die.

Screaming protest, her tired legs launched her into full-bodied flight toward her goal, errant thoughts raging with her crystalline mind that the distance was too great. Yet her subconscious demanded to be heard, willing her into action, persistent that there was more at play than was first apparent. Time seemed to slow. Lara outstretched her right arm and trained her full focus on the approaching handhold that would save her life, knowing she would need full stretch for fingertip contact.

Body at full stretch, muscles tensed and clearly defined in adrenalin-fuelled readiness, Lara willed her outstretched hand into contact with the handhold. Her fingertips touched the stone and immediately hooked on with a years-trained instinctive reaction, borne of many previous forays into the unknown. Her actions now flowed as if on autopilot. Using her momentum, Lara gently altered the direction of her rapidly fading flight by using the contact she had with the handhold, finely adjusting her travel a little further upward. The string loop at the base of the torch, which was wrapped around her wrist, saved it as she let it go to reach for a second handhold above the first.

Lara's left hand encased the second stone handhold within a granite grip, much to her utter relief. But rest could not be had. Her legs swung beneath her as the momentum of her jump still acted on her lower body, causing her to sway wildly in mid air as he clung to the handholds.

With mere moments to spare, Lara had seen a square tunnel running straight up from the roofline of the passageway, only being alerted to its presence by the altered appearance of the torch beam on the ceiling as she'd bolted down the passageway. Her subconscious had noted something different in the ceiling before the dead end, and Lara had schooled herself to _listen_ to what her mind was telling her in situations like this. Some people dismissed the subconscious mind as an uncontrollable sixth sense that gifted only few individuals. But through meditation, and the skilled guidance of Tibetan monks high in their mountain top monastery, Lara had learned the art of communing with her subconsciousness. It had told her two things. One was the very presence of the ceiling tunnel, the second, far more subtle, was the fact that the roofline had gradually become lower over time, bringing it down to a reachable height.

Arms taught with straining muscles, Lara quickly lifted herself one handhold at a time up into the square opening in the ceiling, her long sessions of one-armed pull-ups paying dividends now that she required the additional dexterity. Her strengthened shoulders flexed and hardened beneath her tight fitting midriff top as they took up the strain of lifting her body higher; Lara wasn't overly muscular but had an agile feminine strength where it counted. She worked fast, her legs still dangled in the danger zone beneath, and she hustled with every reserve of energy she had to pull herself clear of the bone-stripping threat below.

Her senses filled with the sounds of the shattering spikes, surely upon her now. She willed herself to work faster, hand over hand, breaths coming in a shorter rhythm as she expended enormous aerobic energy with her sapping climb up into salvation.

Silence came like a deafening hammer blow as the last vestiges of chaos echoed away through the blackness below in reluctant waves of thwarted chase, seeming to cry out forever in the lengthy darkened halls.

Lara's heartbeat hammered as she schooled her breathing into a more regular and controlled rhythm. She felt her boots gain purchase on a lower step of the stone ladder, now having manoeuvred high enough to gain a foothold. She climbed a few steps higher and allowed herself a momentary rest, feeling the adrenalin as it coursed through her body and made her tremble ever so slightly with a heightened awareness of peril.

Hanging on the stone ladder, Lara closed her eyes and with several deep breaths of subterranean air, sought calm. She flexed each of her arms and legs, still taught from her workout, checking for any injury she might have missed on her adrenalin fuelled high. Her right shoulder was no longer bleeding, the superficial graze having suffered no extra damage in her run through the deviously trapped passage; her shirtsleeve had suffered extra damage though, a tear now making its ruinous way across her shoulder blade. And she was dusty, having collected a fine powder coating from her contacts with the ancient stonework.

Opening her eyes, Lara immediately noted something she had missed in the previous chaos, hardly surprising given how hard pressed she'd been. The torch still dangled from her left wrist, it's white beam hitting the bottom of the tunnel at an obscure angle. Lara clicked it to blackness and patiently waited while her eyes adjusted to the new level of illumination, as she did so, her suspicions solidified into certainty; it wasn't completely dark, there was light coming from somewhere.

The square tunnel was bathed in an ever-so-soft blue light, which seemed to be filtering down from somewhere above. Carefully, Lara resumed her ascent of the stone ladder, a portion of her conscious mind looking for danger, the other luxuriating in the soft embrace of this new wonder. She could see well enough, and decided against using the torch again as it would immediately ruin her night vision; she found herself intrigued, like a moth to the flame, at exactly what the source of the light might be, and did not want to miss something subtle.

Lara climbed for a few minutes before she began to feel a subterranean air current against her sweat sheened midriff and arms, the gentle air current cooling her exposed skin with a tingle, as if it had come to investigate this new visitor after centuries of silent lone vigilance. She knew that underground passageways and cave systems often breathed as temperature differences in certain parts caused air to expand and contract, making air from other areas also move to compensate for the changed air pressure in that area. Most typically, it occurred close to outside entrances where the cave air became affected by temperatures on the surface. A cold night on the surface for example, would cause the warmer air in the cave to rise out through higher entrances, and cooler air to be drawn in from entrances lower down, and so the cave would 'breathe'.

Anticipation built within her as she spied the top of the square tunnel above, the square horizon clearly outlined against a stronger blue light beyond. Climbing with steady pace, Lara made her way to the blue horizon and halted. She peered out at what appeared to be a pyramid shaped ceiling built from a yellowish stone; it reflected the muted blue light somewhat, but gave nothing away as to what was above. Slowly, Lara lifted her eyes above the horizon, unable to contain her curiosity any longer.

She blinked.

_What the?_

She closed her eyes for some seconds, and then opened them again. The sight was still there.

"Oh, _no way,_" she breathed in wonderment. She was filled with awe and blurted in hushed bewilderment, "What _is_ this place? Is this even possible?" She knew her eyes could not be lying, and took a moment to gaze upon what she saw, and the portents it heralded.

She heard no noise, and slowly climbed out of the tunnel to stand beneath a square pergola like structure built from stone. She found the pergola stood on a raised platform also square in shape and around two meters high, and had steps radiating out to the ground in all directions around her.

She had emerged into a massive cavern, easily of a size comparable to the largest sporting stadiums around the world. As her eyes roamed the vista, she struggled to make out the rocky walls and roof of the cavern, seeming to be lost amid the limits of her vision. The entire cavern was bathed in a soft blue light, giving Lara a distinct shadow as she stepped from the cover of the stone pergola. However, it was the source of the light that had taken Lara's breath away, seeming an impossibility in such a place as this. Lara stood at the precipice of the stairs leading down, and gazed upon such beauty she never thought could exist.

Reaching down from the top of the cavern was a massive blue crystal prism, glowing steadily, and radiating an unearthly shade of pale blue light out into the cavern to softly caress each object within. The crystal was formed perfectly, an elongated six–sided mineral formation capped at the end in a pointed prismatic pyramid, each face lustrous and perfectly smooth, as if some grand designer had shaped it so. As she stared, trancelike, Lara swore she could see internal structures within the crystal, catching and projecting the light in complex plays of changed direction, before eventually allowing it to escape and illuminate the cavern. Tearing her eyes from the impossible sight, she noticed additional, much smaller blue crystals throughout the cavern, illuminating it as though it were the milky way shining ablaze in the clear night sky.

Lara descended the stone steps, eyes wide, swallowing in disbelief, trying to add logical explanation to the existence of the cavern. Equally impossible however, was the presence of lush broadleaf plants, extending in massive grandeur toward the blue sources of light scattered throughout the inconceivable space. In fact, the floor of the cavern was a veritable jungle of plants, each with sizable broad leaves soaking up as much of the soft light as possible. There was also the soft burbling of running water, escaping through the foliage to betray the presence of a stream or gentle waterway hidden somewhere within the living creations.

Winding into the stilled jungle was a paved pathway, quickly becoming lost amid huge dangling fronds that extended into every free space available; left at the mercy of the growing wonders for centuries, it had all but disappeared. The tall plants easily hid anything else that might be hidden within the cavern, the stone pergola itself only having a small clearing that remained free of plant life, though Lara strongly suspected that given time, it too would be swallowed up by the subterranean jungle.

Reaching the bottom of the steps, Lara stepped out onto the black stone pavers that made the winding forest walkway, noting the intriguing grey soils to either side, moist with life-giving seepage. The cavern was silent, only the softly burbling brook within produced noise, and the subterranean wind she felt earlier causing only the slightest silent movents through the masses of large dangling leaves and fronds.

She suddenly pulled both Heckler and Koch pistols, the movement shaming lightning.

She'd heard something else.

Both guns poised at shoulder height she listened with stilled breath.

Slowly she turned back toward the square pergola, and the square tunnel that had bought her here, her tuned senses sifting out the source of the new noise. Pistols aimed, she climbed the steps with silent stalking paces, listening to the noises faintly echoing up to her from the dark passages below. Reaching the edge of the tunnel descending down from the pergola's platform, she knelt, and heard sounds from below she knew all too well.

Spikes shattered far below, the noise of them hitting the passageway walls and splintering to pieces reverberating up through the narrow access tunnel to meet her eardrums, leaving her in no doubt. The traps were being activated again. Her eyes moulded to a steely gaze as she stared down the access tunnel, past the barrel of her right-handed Heckler and Koch, and into the enveloping blackness beyond.

Her mysterious follower had returned once more, persistent, cunning, and clever to pursue her this far. It told her the person was resourceful. It told her they were dangerous. It told her they were driven. Her pistol softly glinted under the light of the crystal, forming lines of reflected light across it polished surface. She clicked the safety back into place on the weapon and paused as she sifted the implications the persistent follower presented. Turning then, she stared down the broken path leading into the subterranean forest, her long braid flexing easily having again become draped over her shoulder. Flicking it behind her with a polished gun barrel, she moved away from the tunnel and down the stone steps once again, her incessant calm forming her movements with iron resolve.

It was time the follower caught her up, if able, and for the hunted to become the hunter.


	5. Wings of Wrath

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**So. Here I am. At it again. Continuing this little story of intrigue, plots, and gunpowder.  
Hopefully, you all find it easy enough to figure out what's going on. I mean, heck, _I've_ got it figured, but the thing is, _you_ guys need to as well.  
Otherwise you'll just read a heap of blab that's kinda weird, shake your head, and blacklist the entire story. :).**

**"Man," you'll say, "That Ironhound belongs in another solar system!"**

** Love or hate it! Wings of Wrath is here. This time I've re-worked it before posting it up. Still a little more to go with that but... The heck with it!**

**Moderate bad language. They _are_ bad guys. Nevertheless I tried to temper the bad language enough to keep the story inoffensive. Hope it worked... :)**

**Please let me know what you think. Good or bad. :)**

**ØØØ**

**UPDATES  
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**26 March 2010 - Chapter edited.**

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***4*  
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**Wings of Wrath**

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**The Skies of Northern Spain.  
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**T**he setting sun cast a fire-orange glow over the cirrocumulus clouds sitting high amid the upper troposphere at 30,000 feet; their presence the tell tale sign of unstable air at that altitude. The sun's great fireball slowly descended toward the rounded masses of stratocumulus clouds on the horizon below, soon to be enveloped within their soft grey-white embrace. Between was crystal clear sky, where no mark of mankind blighted the majestic atmosphere, making it a pure and surreal place of quiet beauty.

A speck appeared above the surreal backdrop of lazily floating stratocumulus clouds, which drifted without care or issue far below at 7,000 feet. Moving on bedevilled wings at supersonic speed, it cut through the crystalline air without caution or consequence. Twin Lyulka AL-37FU turbofan engines shrieked in fury as they thrust the speck toward the waiting horizon, and the brilliant orange disc of the slowly setting sun. Forward-swept wings carried it, built from the latest advances in composite material technology; they allowed the supersonic object a significantly increased maneuverability through the air, both at speed, and while cruising. The sleek, jet-black craft should not have existed, yet it's owner was a devious, brilliant, and cunning man.

Known to the world as the highly experimental Sukhoi Su-47 supersonic jet fighter, its design was the brilliant work of the Russian Sukhoi Aviation Corporation, and was still considered a prototype with precious few examples in existence. Until William Cortez had shrewdly stolen the designs for the advanced aircraft, modified them to suit his needs, and built several to further his own malevolent ends. A full payload of advanced weaponry sat beneath the wings and fuselage of the blackened bird of prey. A 30mm Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-30-1 cannon armed with high explosive rounds for air-to-air combat began the loadout, followed by no less than 14 hardpoints for air-to-air and air-to-surface missiles. She was a deadly mistress of the skies; exuding a sleek, high-tech grace that seemed to command the very airspace around her as she rocketed in the throes perfectly orchestrated flight.

With only clouds to bear witness, the Sukhoi banked suddenly and began a rapid descent toward the wavetops of the Atlantic Ocean waiting far below. A barrel-chested man sat in the pilot's seat behind a pair of Randolph Aviator sunglasses and a black oxygen mask. His tree-trunk arms worked the flight stick with delicate precision, the deft movements seeming to be at odds with his brawlers physique. Behind the mask, he grinned with delight, feeling the sudden G-forces act upon his body and produce an adrenalin fuelled high, but also finding amusement at the plight of his ashen-faced passenger.

Gareth Denn sat immediately behind the amused pilot in the Sukhoi's passenger seat, just _one_ of many modifications made to the aircraft's original design. His complexion was very pale, and he was trying desperately not to vomit amid waves of weightless vertigo.

"Muffai!" Gareth pleaded, his voice thick with nausea. "Are you trying to kill us?"

"Relax amigo!" Muffai replied, again tilting the control stick, this time to the side, with immediate effect. The Sukhoi's right wing shot upwards, tilting it side-on towards the ground, and offering its occupants a panoramic view of the cloud tops below. "You know you're alive now eh?"

"I feel like death warmed up you lunatic!" Gareth shouted breathlessly. "I'm about to spray my lunch all over this coffin-cockpit!"

Muffai glanced at a small screen amid the dials of his tactical readout, it displayed a video feed of his passenger, and he indeed noted Gareth's rapidly flagging composure. With a growl Muffai said, "You've got to toughen up Gareth! If William Cortez sees you are weak in _any_ way, he will kill you."

"Fantastic. I'm dead either way then," Gareth replied, his voice hoarse from tension.

Relenting, Muffai allowed the Sukhoi to level out and cruise in stable flight, much to his passenger's great relief. Gareth took a deep breath and relaxed into his seat as much as he found possible, strapped down inside his G-suit as he was. Muffai spoke into his helmet-mounted microphone with a bar-room-brawlers lecturing tone.

"_Listen,_ amigo," he began. "William Cortez, who you'll be meeting shortly, is ruthless, evil, and fucking _crazy._ If you think I'm a bad son of a bitch then think again. Compared to Cortez I'm a mewling bloody kitten! And you are a scum who lives only to serve him! Remember that, and you _might_ stay alive!"

"You make him sound like the bloody Devil!" Gareth replied, voice slightly steadier.

"_That_ man _is_ the bloody Devil amigo," Muffai stated with strained caution. " I swear it to God almighty!"

"Don't tell me you're frightened of him?"

Muffai didn't answer immediately; letting the roar of the Lyulka engines aid his forming thoughts. "Afraid? No, not afraid. If he kills me today I don't give a shit. I'm easy with the fact I might die today; you have to be when you work for William Cortez."

Gareth looked up through the clear canopy and sought solace in the glowing-ember blanket of lit Cirrus clouds above, but found it fleeting, despite the grand spectacle on display. "You're saying my new boss is a psychotic killer? Fan-bloody-tastic. I knew I should have taken that job in the goddamn Bahamas."

"Wouldn't have mattered," Muffai replied. "Once he gets his hooks in – that's it."

"What do you mean 'that's it'?"

"I mean Cortez gets what Cortez wants. If Cortez want's something and can't get it, then neither does anybody else."

"_Jesus Christ!_" Gareth blurted after a short pause, recognition dawning. "He'd have killed me if I refused the job?"

"Very likely," Muffai said, almost conversationally. "Nothing fancy, you'd have been shot in your sleep or you'd have simply just vanished. Depends who Cortez sent to do the job."

"You?" Gareth asked, not really wanting to hear the answer.

Muffai chuckled darkly. "Perhaps. But I'd have dropped you off a trawler deep out to sea with an anchor chained to your feet. No mess that way, except maybe for the sharks."

"You're a class act Muffai," Gareth replied unsteadily, still eyeballing the fire-draped blanket above. "If Cortez is so off the deep end, why stay? Why not resign and farm olives?"

"You resign in front of William Cortez with a bullet in your brain," Muffai warned. "There _is_ no resigning. Just keep him happy or disappear without a trace."

"I fucking _knew _you'd say something like that!"

"It's not so bad Gareth. Get to know how he works and he'll look after you. I've got all the money I need and more. I can kill a whore if she slaps me around too much and Cortez makes the law go away. I've got a bar in Lisbon that I've filled with talented pole dancers too. Gets crowded every night, and those rich enough can spend a night with the girls. Free for me though – and you now that we're work colleagues. I rule that place like a lord. It's a simple pleasure I know, but I'm a simple man at heart."

The Sukhoi's navigation computer chimed and Muffai ended the conversation. "We've reached the coast of Spain amigo. Make sure that bloody lunch of yours stays in your God forsaken stomach; I'm taking us down."

Gareth groaned.

Once more the Sukhoi dipped toward the waiting waves of the Atlantic Ocean, and the picturesque coastline of Northern Spain. The looping shapes of the stratocumulus clouds now rapidly approaching as the black jet shot toward mother earth, soon filling the view from the cockpit window with impossible creations of crafted white vapour as rising air currents contorted the gathered moisture with massive artistic strokes.

The Sukhoi punched into the clouds like an arrow through butter and became enveloped within their dense fog. Eerie evening light filtered through the vapour and lit the cockpit with a depressing gloom, which did nothing to lift the spirits of Cortez' newest employee. Convection currents within the cloud cells did their best to jostle the Sukhoi off course, but Muffai would have none of it, and guided the sleek black dragon through the turbulence with a practiced, steady hand. Gareth's lunch threatened exposure again, but he willed it to stay put.

Hitting clear air below the clouds, the breathtaking panorama of the Asturias coastline of Northern Spain came into view. Snow topped mountains dominated the vista, intermingled with green alpine pastures and the painted pastel colours of Beech forest. Muffai cut the angle of descent, shifting the immediate view from the cockpit window to include the misted over-land horizon, now somewhat darkened in the fading evening light. Gareth thought it odd that a man such as Cortez would choose to live in such a picturesque location, somehow, the firepits of hell sounded like they'd suit him better.

Before long, the screaming shriek of the Lyulka turbofan jets began to buzz the inhabited coastline, the people looking up in awe as the angular shape thundered over them and was gone in moments; the Spanish Air Force doing an evening training run they thought. Muffai was tempted to hit the afterburners and give the people below a wake up call with the sonic boom he'd create, sense prevailed however, knowing that Cortez would have to grease palms to make officials 'forget' what had happened. The Air Force were not allowed to sonic boom over civilisation, only accelerating above mach 1 well away from built up areas. Unnecessary attention was something they didn't need right now.

The setting sun had found a gap in the clouds on the distant horizon, and was colouring the ocean breakers below them a fire-tinged orange as they rolled toward the rocky shoreline. Misted amid the moisture-laden air, Muffai made out the landmark he was looking for, a small coastal village nestled inside a natural rocky harbour. Small stretches of beachsand dotted the harbour at various points, and he swore he'd build a resort for the rich there when he retired. He'd bring in his pole dancers to cater for their worldly needs; _if_ Cortez ever did let him retire.

The Sukhoi banked left and turned it's course over land, heading toward the Picos de Europa Mountains where Muffai knew Cortez' empire was based. Fired sunlight reflected off the snow-capped mountains as they caught the final brilliance of the setting sun, now dipping well below the horizon and out of sight. Green pastures dotted with the occasional small village disappeared beneath them as the mountains grew closer and began to dominate their view from the cockpit. Muffai spied the gap in the mountains he was looking for, and angled the Sukhoi's flightpath to intercept.

They entered a steep-sided valley with the jagged limestone peaks of the Picos de Europa towering above them on either side; the airborne jet dwarfed by the massive karst landscape. Muffai slowed their airspeed as he searched the v-shaped valley opening out ahead of them, dropping the Sukhoi still lower toward the rock-strewn valley floor. Gareth could not hold his nervous tongue any longer as he looked out nervously at the steep mountainsides flashing by.

"Where did you learn to fly again?" he asked apprehensively.

Muffai's dark chuckle came again. "Skittish Gareth?"

"Not at all. I always hurtle through deep mountain passes with a _deathwish_ on my days off. Gets you up close and personal with the geology."

Muffai again chucked, not fooled for an instant by Gareth's false display of Bravado. "Do this a hundred times and you'll be _bored_ of it amigo."

"No kidding? Only a hundred?" Gareth replied sarcastically.

"Air is the only real way to reach Cortez' village," Muffai answered. "There _is_ a road up through the mountains, but it has a reputation for killing people, rockfalls usually, or a trip down the mountainside. Take your pick."

Talk died as Muffai put the Sukhoi into a sharp right turn and threaded the jet into a narrow steep sided canyon, causing yet another deeply inrushed breath from his adrenalin-wired passenger.

The narrow canyon lasted only a few minutes; it ended suddenly, and they shout out over a majestic flat-bottomed valley carpeted with green alpine pastures and small stands of Beech, now standing unruffled in the chilled dusk air. The valley was somewhat circular, and sizeable, being some miles in both length and width, but walled on each side by towering, snow-dusted limestone peaks. A large complex of buildings dominated the centre of the valley. Large industrial looking warehouses stood off to one side, and a 'village' of sorts stood off to another. The village was dominated by a massive mansion, which was a modern structure of steel frame, concrete, and glass; but also intermingled with sections of polished carpentry, giving it a somewhat alpine ski lodge appearance. Far older appearing village houses sprawled out around the mansion, their curved-tile rooves and limestone brickwork giving away their ancestry. Smoke rose from chimneys atop some of the houses, as well as from several atop Cortez' mansion.

The Sukhoi washed off speed as Muffai engaged it's highly advanced thrust vectoring systems, allowing him to direct the thrust from the Lyulka engines in directions other than parallel to the jet's longitudinal axis. The Sukhoi Aviation Corporation had not yet made their jets hover capable. Cortez however, had brilliantly engineered the ability into his own fleet of Sukhoi jets, giving them the ability of vertical take-off and landing, otherwise known as VTOL.

As they approached the vast complex of buildings, a central asphalted runway became brilliantly illuminated; an array of blue lighting was coming to life down its entire length, showing them the way in the fading light. The runway appeared to split the warehouses from the village, having the industrial buildings to one side and the village on the other, as if intended as a buffer of some sort.

Muffai vectored the engine thrust further as they sank down over the runway, the majority of the jet's forward momentum now spent. An illuminated 'X' sat at the centre of the runway marking their landing pad, also glowing an eerie blue. Slowly they hovered in over the runway, slowly descending, and creating a storm of flying dust as they went. The blue 'X' appeared beneath them and Muffai dropped the Sukhoi gently to the asphalt surface, it's landing wheels sustaining only a slight bump as contact was made.

Silence came as Muffai shut down the engines and also began putting the onboard flight systems through shut down sequences of their own. He then unlatched the clear canopy and slid it back; both men unbuckled, stood, and took their first clear breaths of chilled alpine air.

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**T**he last vestiges of a blood-red skyline were slowly fading over the mountains as Gareth and Muffai stretched and jogged on the spot by the heat-pinging Sukhoi. Both men were glad to be free of the fighter jet's cockpit and able to move around freely. After a few minutes, a set of headlights emerged from the village and shone out across the runway before setting a course directly toward them, the crisp lights forming halos in the moisture filled air. The noise of the vehicle's burbling engine gave it away as an older model V8, and Gareth found himself wondering just who the welcoming committee inside could be.

"We didn't arrive unnoticed then?" he said nodding toward the approaching vehicle.

Muffai turned to face him with an all-knowing smile. "Not since we dropped out of the clouds off the coast amigo," He replied. "Cortez' radar systems can pick up toilet roll fluttering in the breeze, let alone one of his own fighter jets. Nobody comes here without his knowing."

"No problems with vacuum cleaner salesmen then I take it?"

Muffai chuckled. "No amigo, no problems with anyone." Then he became deadly serious and the smile vanished. "Listen, just follow my lead tonight ok. If I laugh then _you_ find it amusing too. If I _don't_ laugh then you don't even smile. Ok? Don't say a _word_ unless Cortez directly asks you something. If you talk out of turn he'll shoot you dead, depending on what mood he's in. Got it?"

"Christ you're not kidding are you?" Gareth asked.

"No amigo, I'm not kidding. Keep that wisecracking under wraps too; Cortez isn't one for humour. I don't know who's in that car, but whoever it is, they'll be an assassin like me. Just keep your head and do what I do, or else you'll be garden bed fertiliser. Ok? Got it?"

Gareth shook his head, wondering just what the hell he'd gotten himself into. "Yeah. Got it. Tread lightly, no wisecracking."

The vehicle that approached soon revealed itself to be from a bygone era of American motoring, a 1959 Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz. Massive tailfins rose up from the rear of the vehicle, almost appearing like the wings of the Sukhoi parked nearby. Twin bullet tail lamps lit the deep 'V' at the rear of the fins in pure late-fifties flamboyance, but somehow seemed right at home alongside the gleaming chrome grille and whitewall tyres. Lustrous red paintwork gleamed as the large vehicle entered the harsh white-light nimbus surrounding the landing pad, the powerful overhead floodlights having come on soon after Gareth and Muffai landed. A convertible, with roof stowed, it had plush red-leather seats and an immaculate 1950's dashboard that could clearly be seen as the vehicle rolled to a stop beside them and the 390 cubic-inch V8 engine quit to silence.

Muffai seemed not to see the car however, and his eye's narrowed at the two female occupants now moving to exit the vehicle. One seemed to be having difficulty, flopping with the doorhandle awkwardly, the sight of her unnatural movements strangely setting his hair on end. Gareth had not yet moved his eyes past the jewel-like grille patterns on the front of the vehicle to study its occupants. It was his first mistake.

A well-muscled woman with black crew-cut hair stood beside the driver's door with heavily planted feet, her low-cut black singlet top and tight fitting bicycle pants clearly displaying an over-strengthened body. Muffai knew her, and luckily he'd established a working relationship with her over the years. Her chemically enhanced strength could simply tear any man apart if she so wished, and she was known for wishing it often. He spoke in a careful, yet friendly tone of greeting to her.

"Elissa! You're looking deadly as always. Never thought you'd be a taxi driver though."

The woman smiled a malevolent smile and ran her hand over her short bristle-like haircut. "It's good to see you still alive Muffai. You still owe me a wrestling match _little_ man, remember? I don't _like_ it when my quarry escapes." She stepped around the front of the car with heavy footfalls and stopped by the passenger's door. She nodded toward the second woman, still seated inside the vehicle. "You'd better say hello to William, before he gets the idea you're impolite."

Elissa opened the door for the woman, who said in a slurred voice. "Thankyou Elissa, can't make these damn hands work so well just yet."

Gareth gawped open mouthed, and Muffai shot him a warning glance, which Elissa also caught with a slight smirk. Gareth fought to compose himself.

The seated woman flopped her arms and legs drunkenly as she swung her long legs out of the car and stood with teetering balance, using a hand on Elissa's shoulder for support. Her head rolled lazily to face Muffai, and her eyes swirled in their sockets for some moments before they seemed to steady and focus. Her free hand looped up to her face to brush her lustrous shoulder length fire-red hair away from her eyes, which were then revealed to be a golden yellow colour. She wore a fire engine red minidress which did little to hide the curves of her slim body, a deep lace up vee running down the front of the garment showed plenty of skin, and that she clearly worked out. Black calf-high leather boots and black hair ribbons completed the outfit. Muffai had never seen her before in his life.

"Mufph – Muf—fai!" she said to him, haltingly. "Itsh me! William! I – can control her! But it's damn difficult b – being a woman!" The woman then laughed somewhat drunkenly. Muffai was taken aback.

"Boss?" he questioned incredulously. "You're controlling this – woman? Speaking through her and – making her move?"

Elissa's smile became a devil-smirk. "He said so didn't he _little_ man?"

"Leave him Elissa," Cortez smiled through the woman. "He's bought me my pyramid from that bitch Lara Croft." The woman's gaze narrowed through only one eye. "Didn't you Muf—fai?"

Muffai held up a black backpack he'd had slung over his shoulder. "Her butler tried shooting us to hell, but Lara's treasure room is now minus one small stone pyramid." His pointed gaze offered challenge to Elissa with a smirk of his own, before switching back to Cortez' puppet.

Cortez made the woman grin lopsidedly. "Excellent my friend!" She pointed at him, loosely waggling her finger, her speech becoming smoother. "You've done well! Bring it back to my office so I can start studying it." Her arm and pointed finger then shot toward Gareth. "And bring your gawping new p—pet! My Christ forsaken laptop keeps producing a 'Catastrophic Failure', which made me kill my b—best bloody gardener today. Maybe he can sort it!"

With that the woman turned, now wobbling without Elissa's support, and flopped back into the Cadillac's plush red leather passenger seat, her minidress riding dangerously high as she did so.

Elissa, still smirking, nodded toward Muffai, who simply stood with an unreadable expression. "You heard the lady!" she said with maliciously layered undertones. "Get in the back _little_ man, and don't scratch the paintwork." She then turned to Gareth and a deadly smile appeared. "_You_ sit behind _me_ little pet. You and I have business to attend later."

Muffai knew then that Gareth was in trouble. He _had_ tried to warn him. He nodded almost imperceptibly toward him, catching his eye, trying to get him to remember what they'd discussed earlier.

Gareth caught Muffai's movement, and nodded toward Elissa in agreeance, trying to produce a nonchalant expression of his own. The Cadillac had no rear doors, being a two-door model only, and it was necessary for the two men to climb into the rear seats being extremely careful their boots did not contact the gleaming paintwork as they did so.

Elissa seated herself in silence behind the steering wheel, and Cortez chuckled in triumph as he successfully closed his own passenger door through the control he had over his feminine host.

"You don't suppose this damn bitch is retarded do you Elissa?" Cortez asked his muscled offsider as she twisted the Cadillac's key in the ignition barrel.

"She's a pretty bitch William, but she can use that Katana of hers, I'll give her that. At least she hasn't gone mad yet like that other pathetic doll last week."

The Cadillac's engine caught and roared to life.

The redhead almost laughed, as if in sudden remembrance of a fond memory. "That useless one who hacked her head off with that old garden shovel?" She sighed in agreeance. "You're right, this one doesn't seem _that_ bad. Her mind seems more agreeable to domination."

"Actually I meant that German woman who set your Porsche 911 alight and drove it up the runway until it exploded." Elissa replied, grinning her hellish grin.

"Oh her!" Cortez replied. "She was fucking crazy!"

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**T**he mismatched foursome treaded along the polished wooden floors of Cortez' sizable mansion. The redhead still walked haltingly, but no longer required any assistance from Elissa's strengthened bulk. They arrived at a set of large oaken double doors, exquisitely carved with images of square-rigged sailing ships and 16th century Spanish soldiers, in the midst of some battle or other. Elissa stepped forward with outstretched arms and pushed with both hands against the solid and weighty doors, causing them to swing inward on silent hinges.

"Come on in," the redhead said in her feminine voice, but it came in stereo with a much deeper male voice from beyond the heavy doors. Elissa held the doors open for the woman to enter, but left Gareth and Muffai to their own devices by entering immediately behind her. Gareth found he needed to heft a single door with his shoulder to move it, having only a fraction of Elissa's enhanced strength.

Cortez' 'office' was a huge rectangular space. A lengthy triple-glazed floor to ceiling window ran along the entire back wall, and offered panoramic views of the village in the foreground, and the dark hulking shapes of the mountains against a starlit sky further from view. One end of the room held a lively stonework fireplace, now hosting animated flames as they chewed and popped through the large wooden blocks burning inside. In front of the fireplace sat plush, black leather sofa's, into one of which Cortez had steered his redhead host; she now sat with a blank expression, her red strands falling partly in front of her unseeing golden yellow eyes.

Elissa moved to stand by the fireplace, fixing both men with an unreadable smirk as she did so, she then turned her back toward the flames to soak up their radiated warmth.

Muffai did not move as he stood before Cortez' large Jarrahwood desk, it's polished surface gleaming under the glow of soft downlights set into the ceiling above. Gareth followed suit.

Cortez sat at the desk, wearing a tangled contraption of wires and fluids inside glass vials that were built into a silver-steel helmet sitting atop his head. The extensive wiring disappeared into a tall portable rack of computers and other unimaginable blinking devices that appeared almost alien. Eye's rolled upwards, he reached over to a vastly complex keyboard sitting in front of him and tapped out a lengthy set of commands. The helmet responded with a hissing sound and various fluids flowed through clear plastic tubes for a few moments. The redhead, who was sitting stiff as a board, suddenly slumped back into her sofa and didn't move; she appeared unconscious.

Elissa moved to check the woman's pulse, placing rough fingers upon the redhead's neck to ensure blood still pumped through her carotid artery. Satisfied, she grunted nonplussed. "She's alive." She then resumed her place beside the fire.

Cortez' eyes blinked rapidly several times, as if he attempted to clear them of caught grit. His eyes then focussed immediately upon the two men standing before him, intelligent malice plainly evident within his steel-grey stare.

"Gentlemen," he greeted them with the slightest nod.

Muffai simply nodded his own greeting in reply; Gareth did the same moments later, Muffai's earlier words consuming his conscious thought.

_Don't say a word unless Cortez directly asks you something…._

Cortez, mercifully, focussed directly upon Muffai. "My pyramid if you please Muffai," he asked, amid removing the wired up helmet from his head.

Muffai unzipped the backpack he had in his hands and removed the ancient carved-stone pyramid from within, as well as a small square of white felt. He then stepped forward and placed the felt square down on the polished surface of the desk, immediately before Cortez, and then set down the small stone pyramid itself on top of the felt. He stepped back silently, watched closely all the way by malevolent steel-grey eyes.

Elissa nodded slightly, knowing Muffai had sidestepped a bullet by not scratching the high polish of Cortez' desk, such were his wiles.

Cortez set the helmet aside on his desk, training the thick array of wiring along a less intrusive path across it. His close-cropped jet-black hair was tidily combed and he appeared to be a man of about Forty years in age. His features appeared weathered suggesting a bent for the outdoors, rather than a secluded indoor lifestyle. He wore a grey collared shirt and plain black trousers, and appeared ordinary enough, yet a presence radiated from the man like a persistent gun aimed at one's soul. He smiled, affably enough, and slid the tissue-box sized pyramid directly in front of him.

"What's this about getting shot by the bitch's butler?" he asked with cool tones, not looking up, and running his fingers over the carved lines of the pyramid.

Elissa grinned like the devil.

Gareth tensed.

Muffai thought quickly.

"The old fossil had a shotgun, and tried blasting us away with it. Rodriguez chased him off but was careless, and got himself stabbed through the heart by a glass shard that fell from above Lara's swimming pool."

Cortez was silent a moment.

"Rodriguez never was all that brilliant," he replied eventually, closely scrutinising the pyramid's carvings. "Not bad with a gun though. But stupid fools always end up dead eh Amigo?"

"Always," Muffai replied evenly, after a slight pause of his own.

"My my, death by falling glass! I could use that you know. I need some new torture ideas for some Russian diplomats down in my cells." He smirked.

Muffai did not.

Gareth remained unreadable.

_If I __don't__ laugh then you don't even smile. Ok? _

"Now what about that officer from my personal guard Muffai? How the _fuck_ did _he_ get killed?"

Elissa beamed with hell-bent pleasure, knowing Muffai had screwed up.

Muffai thought quickly, but remained steadfast.

"The butler had crashed his car into a drainage ditch, and your man ran up to the drivers window and made a fool of himself. Didn't pull the trigger like he should have, and the butler beat him to it. I can't protect fools, no matter who they are."

Elissa paused, not believing that Muffai could be so bold. She glanced at Cortez, almost certain of explosive anger. Muffai however, had worked for Cortez more than twenty years, and knew more of his twisted philosophy than anyone else now alive. He had become expert at dancing the knife-edge of Cortez' sanity.

Anger briefly washed over Cortez' features all the same, and Muffai stood ready for death. After a few moments however, the anger dissipated and Cortez spoke with his steel-edged cool of before.

"I won't have any _fools_ in my personal guard Amigo. I should thank you for weeding him out, but try not to kill any more. Those morons cost me a lot to train and I _hate_ wasting money." He then glanced up at Muffai to push home his last point. "But don't _push_ me Muffai. I've looked after you until now, and I can break you down in ways even _you_ could not believe!"

Cortez opened a desk drawer and took out a gleaming Smith & Wesson Model 500 revolver. The handgun was among the biggest and most powerful in the world. Firing Smith & Wesson's half-inch Magnum cartridges, the gun could be used for hunting large African game quite successfully, which made human quarry extremely insignificant for such a weapon.

Slamming it down on the desk atop stacked paperwork, Cortez pointed a finger. "You know the rule of the gun Muffai! We both live by it. We both die by it. You should remember that!"

"I know it well William," Muffai stated in reply, unshakeable, and meeting Cortez' gaze. "I've lived by it for twenty years and it's served me well. When I die under the rule of the gun, rest assured, I'll bloody-well deserve it."

Cortez peered at his longest serving employee, and nodded, satisfied. He noted Elissa's intrigued stare from the fireplace; clearly she expected something more to follow. _Very_ few people could hold a battle of wills with William Cortez, and Elissa knew this painfully well.

"No need to worry my little Amazon Warrior," Cortez said, smiling toward her. "Muffai knows his place within my household."

"As long as I remain your favourite William," she replied, fixing him with an intent grin that left many undertones unspoken.

"How could _that_ ever change?" Cortez replied. "I've perfected you and nothing will make me think otherwise."

Elissa's hell-smile returned and sent shivers down the spines of both men standing before Cortez' large desk as she fixed them both with her baleful assassin's gaze. Her intent was unreadable, but it was clear she had plans for the both of them.

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**T**he mood in the room had lightened considerably. The ruthlessness had gone from Cortez' demeanour, yet it plainly bubbled just below the surface of his present affable nature. The four of them now sat around a coffee table in the black leather sofas situated in front of the crackling fireplace, sipping martini's Cortez had ordered from the house staff. Gareth didn't care much for the somewhat metallic aftertaste of the brew, but dared not appear impolite. The redhead woman was still dead to the world; only the rise and fall of her laced-up chest giving away the fact she was still within the land of the living.

Cortez leaned over the polished beech coffee table and studied the pyramid with an eyeglass held expertly in his right eye. Elissa sat next to Cortez. She and Muffai, who sat opposite, were discussing an operation they'd both done in Cape Town, South Africa, a number of years ago. Elissa laughed with menace as she recounted the murder of a screaming official they had dragged from a whorehouse in the dead of night. Her eye's occasionally flicking across to where Gareth sat in a single recliner furthest from the fireplace, a steel menace apparent in each purposeful look. The redhead was sprawled in another single recliner close to Gareth with her head loosely lolled forward, her red hair hiding her face. With nothing else to do, Gareth soon became intrigued by the stone pyramid Cortez studied, but said nothing.

After a time, Cortez sat back and took a hearty sip from his martini glass. Elissa and Muffai quieted expectantly.

"Extremely interesting," Cortez pronounced, setting his glass down again.

"It seems to be telling of an important journey the Inca undertook not long after my ancestors arrived to bring them into the modern world."

"A journey?" Elissa questioned. "They tried to escape from the conquistadors?"

Cortez pondered. "It's not clear. The pyramid is basically a map describing locations an Incan sailing ship arrived at. However, it does talk about a highly valuable cargo, their people's life's work and knowledge all loaded onto a single sailing ship. It seems they were escaping, but perhaps only to keep this 'cargo' out of the hands of the Spanish."

"An 'Incan' sailing ship?" Muffai asked. "I wasn't aware the ancient Inca built seafaring sailing ships."

Cortez smiled. "Ahh," he said. "There's the enigma. Or so it once seemed." He leaned forward for effect. "In 1533 we, the Spanish, arrived in Peru under the leadership of Francisco Pizarro, who was a truly visionary man. After the necessary murder of Atahualpa, an Incan Emperor, we marched on the city of Cuzco to demand a suitable tribute for the new rulers of the land; _us_. What we found there was beyond anything we had anticipated; the extreme riches and expert stonework of the Inca were truly amazing. Conquistador Pedro Cieza de León even wrote about his astonishment in the book, _Crónicas del Perú,_ that he published upon returning to Spain some years later." Cortez then took on a devious look as he explained further. "What Pedro Cieza de León did not mention though, was that a party of a hundred or so scholars and men of science were seen disappearing into the Andes Mountains just days before the Spanish arrived. Only a few simple farm folk saw them depart in the dead of night, apparently carrying and hauling objects that only the God's themselves could possibly have made."

"These men escaped entrapment at Cuzco and built sailing ships?" Muffai asked, intrigued. "Didn't' Pizarro want to go after them for these 'objects' they carried?"

Cortez mood darkened somewhat. "Pizarro became embroiled in the conquest of Cuzco, and we could not spare any men to chase them down. Some years later however, we – my forefather, rooted out a small community of Inca living in the mountains in what is now present-day Bolivia. We harried the rabble to the banks of a mighty river, where we did indeed find them attempting to flee onboard a sailing ship, the likes of which we had never seen before in our lives."

"So your forefather caught them then?" Elissa asked, trying to lift Cortez current mood.

"No," Cortez replied coldly. "A younger brother, _Alarico Cortez, _betrayed us." He almost spat the name. "Alarico, to our families great shame sided with those fleeing _dogs,_ and tried to run my forefather through with his sword. The confusion amongst the men was enough to allow the Incan ship to get under way. Although we harried them all the way to the coast, they escaped. Never to be seen again."

An unsettling silence extended for some moments, until Muffai expertly danced the knife's edge.

"Your forefather found out why Alarico betrayed him?" he asked.

"Alarico always did have a useless bleeding heart," Cortez explained with cold steel. "My forefather, also named William, severely wounded that pathetic excuse of a man and left him to drown in the river. We were far better off without him."

"So now that pyramid," Muffai pointed to it, "is the record of where that particular ship went?"

"It has to be," Cortez replied. "No other ship of Incan design could travel in the open ocean. We have never seen another like it since. It _has_ to be!"

"So?" Elissa chimed in. "Where did the ship go? Does the Pyramid say?"

Cortez looked across at his muscled offsider with a devious glare. "Not exactly my sweet Amazon. This pyramid," he nodded toward it, " is only part of the record. It requires further information to fully describe each place name on it. Each of the Incan glyphs carved into it has a second part, which when combined with what we have, will fully reveal the direction and time of travel taken."

Elissa nodded in understanding. "Very devious. A cunning way to further hide where the ship eventually went."

"Exactly," Cortez affirmed.

"But that still doesn't help us," Muffai thought out aloud. "We now need to know where to start looking for the second parts to all those glyphs. Are there any clues William?"

Cortez regarded his most trusted employee with a sparkle in his eye. "Yes, old friend, there is. The only complete glyph on the pyramid is the one designating the Anchotuma Valley in Bolivia, I know _that_ glyph extremely well; my research has turned it up time and time again."

Cortez then sat back, triumphant.

Another short intermission ensued, as each person contemplated the unfolding mystery.

"Do you think the ship carried these – objects of the Gods?" Muffai eventually asked.

"I'm almost certain of it," replied Cortez. "What was found deep beneath Cuzco and also within the mountain tunnels in Bolivia we _did_ find, makes Pedro Cieza de León's 'unbelievable' stonework look like chicken feed. Those Incan scholars had found something, developed _something_ that they didn't want to fall into the hands of the Spanish. I have an idea but — It's inconclusive, I need to find out more."

Muffai noticed Gareth sitting nervously, clearly with something to say.

"It looks like our new employee has something to add William," he said with a trace of humour.

Cortez looked Gareth with impatience. "Well? What is it man?"

"I picked up a Foxhound radio transmission in England. They mentioned that Lara Croft was in Bolivia."

"What!" Anger seethed through Cortez' veins. "That _bitch!_" He pointed directly toward Muffai and Elissa. "I want her _dead_! If she meddles with _my_ affairs she _will_ pay the price!"

Gareth went white.

Cortez stood. "_CHRIST!_" he roared. "I haven't waited five hundred years to be denied by a British _BITCH!"_

Everybody stilled with icy apprehension as Cortez raged.

"Take a jet tomorrow! Go _**KILL**_ her!"

Cortez then went deathly silent.

"This little meeting is over," he said after a moment. His steel-edged calm had returned, thinly veiling hellish anger beneath.

Gareth's head begun to dull, from fear, or something else he didn't know. He downed his second martini in a bid to calm down, but it was terrible stuff and only served to leave him with the terrible metallic aftertaste inside his mouth.

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**S**un shone through a wooden slatted window, and threw harsh glaring lines across two figures dumped unceremoniously across a simple double bed.

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Conciousness came slowly, her mind grappling and groping through a sickening nauseous fog for clear thought. Her mouth contained a terrible sweet, yet smoking resinous taste that threatened to spill the contents of her stomach. Her arms and legs felt like lead weights, and she fought to move them through what seemed like a cloying thick atmosphere.

Memory came to her in fits and starts, images she did not know, actions she could not explain. Cortez in a rage.

She battled to open heavy eyelids, which were immediately assaulted by the brilliant sunlight streaming in through the window. A stab of searing pain was the result, vaulting through her head like a thousand chainsaws cutting flesh from bone. With effort, she rolled limply from the bed to the floor, thumping down in a tangled heap.

Again she opened her eyes, and now found herself free of the cutting sunlight. Control slowly returning, she cleared lustrous red strands from her vision with a heavy-feeling, yet fine boned hand. She was in a sweat; her body fighting to clear the poison Cortez had injected her with the night before. Her red minidress was now wet to the touch, clinging to her slimline figure with it's collected moisture. She could almost feel the wretchedness of Cortez' concoction, as the last vestiges of it pumped sickeningly through her veins. Cold sweats assaulted her, as if afflicted by Malaria or some other debilitating violation. She rested, waiting, until her swimming vision could produce solid shapes without causing gut wrenching nauseous waves.

After a moment she carefully knelt up beside the bed, her minidress only falling to upper thigh. Someone she didn't know had also been dumped there and lay in misery, having suffered a clear case of Elissa's handiwork; his face bruised and upper body showing clear signs of assault.

He was awake, and silently regarding her.

"Hey there," she said through a fuzzy mouth. "You pissed her off didn't you?"

"Like the blazes it seems," the man replied, wincing from cracked lips. "Don't remember a damn thing though."

"You wouldn't," she replied. "She'll have drugged you. It's just one of her sick ways."

"That God awful martini I drank?" the man asked, grimacing at the thought of it.

The woman smiled in sympathy with perfect white teeth. "That'll be it," she replied.

She rose slowly, fighting for balance, and took tentative steps across the modest room, testing her drug-sickened body. She looked dreadfully tired, as if hung over from a bottle too much tequila. Her long legs appeared fit and unmarked, yet wobbled as she attempted each carefully placed step. She sighed a tired sigh.

"They drugged me as well. Cortez has a vile mix of God-knows-what he injects people with – to control them. Mind control drugs of some sort."

"That bloody spaceman helmet he had on last night must be part of it," the man said, still wincing.

The woman smiled again, wryly this time, intrigued by the man's good humour - considering the condition he was in. "Spaceman helmet? Don't let Cortez hear you say that. You'll put him in another rage."

Suddenly she stumbled, her shapely legs collapsing beneath her, and ended up awkwardly arranged in the middle of the simple stone floor, half kneeling, half sprawled. "I feel terrible," she added after a moment, voice broken.

"Me too," the man replied.

"What's your name?" she asked, righting herself into a lazy kneeling position on the floor. "Seems they're bunking us in together for now. My name is Sunset. Sunset Raine."

"Gareth Denn," the man replied, raising his head unsteadily to meet her eyes, flinching as raw nerves fired. "Hell of a first date, don't you think?"

Sunset smiled again. "Believe it or not, I've had worse."

"I wont ask. Are you a 'pet' as well?" Gareth asked, attempting a smile of his own.

Sunset rolled her golden yellow eyes. "Guilty as charged." Then she regarded him with a fierce finesse-tinged worry. "I think we're in a lot of trouble Gareth Denn."


	6. Veteran's Riposte Part I

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**Aha! You all thought I'd fallen off the edge of the Earth! Didn't you? Maybe some people hoped I did, and are now cursing the fact I've shown up again. Sorry to disappoint... :)**

**Now. I've read and re-read this chapter more times than I can count. I've re-written paragraphs, changed what happens here, altered the story a bit there, deleted swathes, re-positioned bits and generally caused mayhem. I even came out with several lines of poetry a completely murderous nutcase might take to a recital for murdering nutcases. Yeah, weird. Anyway, I got to the point where I was sitting on 8000 words, or so, and realised I wasn't anywhere near done with this particular sequence. So I split it into part one and part two. I now need Part one to sit and gel for a while. No doubt in two weeks or a month's time I'll come back, read it, curse loudly at nobody in particular, and proceed to re-write large chunks of it again. I mean - that's what happened last time. Ultimately, parts one and two will be a single chapter.  
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**There'll be some issues with it, like there always seems to be. I'll be reading through and fixing things as I find them. Let me know if you also see something that needs fixing. I'm not going to fly off into a rant because you found a spelling mistake or you found I did something else weirdly offbeat. I _want _you to tell me.  
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**Before you ask, Lara's on her way back. After part II. I just need to - give her something to think about. :)**

**UPDATES**

**14th APRIL 2010 - Began a few edits to some passages that didn't read smoothly.**

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***5*  
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**VETERAN'S RIPOSTE**

Part One

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**Oxford, England.  
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**Dense thunderheads** lit with brilliant white fire as lightning speared across the angered Oxford sky in the darkest hours of night; the brief illuminations only momentarily forcing back the deep shadow enshrouding cobbled streets and stone façade buildings. Rain fell, like the devil; the wind driving it into even the furthermost reaches of dry safety as it howled through darkened laneways and past tightly shuttered windows. Yellowed streetlight struggled upward to faintly wash the clouded underside of the water-laden storm cell, now thrashing the cosmopolitan town with indefatigable fury. Bull-nosed air currents punched through the incessant heavy rain as if invisible beasts charged along the cobbled streets, distorting the otherwise regular and rhythmic water droplets as they plummeted to Earth. Those puddles daring to form amid uneven paving stones or recessed garden beds were whipped into harshly rippled maelstroms and thrashed mercilessly by storm driven wind.

Hardly a soul stirred amid the storm, most being tucked beneath the plush covers of bed or enjoying a final nightcap by the warmth of glowing gas heaters. Amongst the battered thrown shadow however, a cautious human figure made steady progress along the waterlogged footpath; covered with night-black foul weather clothing, the intent or personality of the figure could not be read.

Lightening suddenly bleached the streetscape into a brilliant flickering white brightness; it revealed the scarred facial features and heavyset brow of a viperous man who courted violence as a constant companion. Bloodshot eye's, hidden deeply within the depths of a heavy bad-weather hood, briefly squinted at the sudden assault of brightness, but continued their menacing survey for the streetsign they knew to be close by.

Abruptly, darkness returned, the lightning spent, much to the liking of the stalking figure is it became all but invisible amid more storm-convoluted shadow.

Thunder cracked, crunched, and rolled through the charged sky overhead, reverberating into the distance as it slowly dissipated into the night-bathed countryside surrounding the city. The powerful intensity of the noise caused a pressure wave of vibration within the lone man's chest cavity, and he paused momentarily to revel in its pure force. Power and subjugation were things he respected, were things he knew about, and were his life.

The streetlights flickered, assaulted by lightening somewhere distant along the power grid. Mother Nature was punishing Oxford, as only she knew how, as if attempting to wash and blast the city clean of sin and evil. The man sneered. She'd have to do better than that. He wasn't about to leave just yet, not until he'd had his fun, and his growing desires had been fully sated. He grinned with the memories of past exploits as the mercury-vapour streetlamps began returning unsteadily to full brightness, his uneven and yellowed teeth pronouncing his pleasure in the poisonous recollections. He vowed that this night would be yet another to add to his growing memory bank of malignant pleasures, to satisfy him on those dark nights when he was alone with his thoughts. The streetlights continued to suffer the odd flicker as he passed beneath, the storm raging with sustained chaos, fuelling the lightening bolts as they shot across the sky and peppered the power network with unspent fury.

The man continued with heavy flat-footed steps, spluttering through puddles and defying the driving wind with impunity, until he came upon the streetsign he had been looking for. Rewley Street, just after Hythe Bridge that spanned Castle Mill Stream, a backwater of the River Thames. His yellowed teeth appeared within yet another sneering grin of satisfaction through bloodless lips, his goal was close at hand and the fun was about to begin. His mind became engulfed within a vortex of anticipation as he pictured himself dispensing his master's will, and at the thought of his complete and utter dominion over the screaming souls he might soon find.

Rewley Street was industrial and dark as he made his way along its windswept length; save for the well-lit building he now approached, the falling rain sparkling as it hit the light's nimbus. With cold and calculating ruthlessness, he knew there would only be a skeleton staff in the building at such a late hour, which would cause little to no problem for his ingeniously simple plan. As if to aid with his evilly forming demonic scheme, a stainless steel Sig Sauer P226 Tactical pistol appeared from within the folds of his full-length foul weather jacket. Gleefully, he checked the weapon's .357 cartridge, and it's death-bringing payload of hollow point bullets. Soon he could dance to steps he knew well. Oh yes, very soon.

Another device appeared from the slick wet jacket folds, an M84 stun grenade, or 'Flash-Bang' as they were more commonly known. Flash blindness and deafness were neat little tricks to use when you wanted to make someone obey you, then, it was very easy to have all the fun you wanted. He could hardly wait, and his shivers of anticipation returned with a vengeance. William was a good man for letting him have a little fun like this; it was very rewarding working for a man like him.

Next, he popped a large liquid capsule into his mouth and cracked its contents free with his teeth and swallowed. Immediately he went rigid with drug-spelled pleasure, as the contents began to work their magic throughout his body. He felt euphoria rapidly rise within, like a God, and then felt the unnatural strength once again flow through his body and lift him to a plane higher than any mortal man had a right to reach. His head rolled as the rush mushroomed diabolically within, then his eyes hardened and he stepped into the light of a simple blue and yellow backlit sign.

Foxhound Security.

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**M**alcolm Cullen sipped freshly brewed coffee as he looked out over Castle Mill Stream from his upper-storey office window. Fat raindrops splattered heavily against the glass as he stood peering out at the angry tempest whipping the trees by the stream into a punishing frenzy, twisting and flailing their branches to splinters under the heavy onslaught of the bullish wind outside. He knew the cleanup crews would have their work cut out for them come sunrise, collecting downed branches and setting chainsaws to uprooted trunks. Half the damn streetlights in town were out and the rest were flickering and swaying about like drunken devils at a tequila party.

The rich chocolate smells of his Blue Mountain coffee aided his melding thoughts as he pondered the events of the previous day. Cullen knew with gnawing certainty that only the first few cards in the deck had been played; a hell-bent adversary was clearly determined to get what they wanted out of Lara Croft with liberal doses of gunfire and death. His eyes hardened with the thought. He knew what it was to live with violence and war, having served 10 years with an elite British Special Forces unit in both the first Gulf war and later in Iraq. Human nature, he mused, held untold aggression if left to fester and rot unchecked.

The opaque-green desk lamp nearby flickered for the umpteenth time that night due to continuing storm-induced power fluctuations on the grid. His desk lay strewn with still frame photographs captured from the Croft Mansion security camera systems, as well as the front mounted camera on the now Swiss Cheese Impreza.

Cullen momentarily glanced at the struggling light from his vantage point across the room by the window; heavily suspecting his backup diesel generators in the basement would soon be cranked into service to cover Foxhound's power needs when the grid finally gave out. White light flashed outside, and was immediately followed by a crackling electric boom. Turning his gaze to the window once more, Cullen noted the storm seemed to be gaining intensity; the sky being awash with lightening flashes that glowed in short bursts from deep within the dark clouds overhead.

Several security units were out around the district, and Cullen had thoughts of calling them in to get his staff and vehicles out of harms way. He knew though, that the darker side of humanity often used bad weather like this to cover their operations, thinking that no fool people in their right minds would be out and about to catch them, particularly at this hour. It was 2am, and he was damned if he knew how it had gotten so late. The smooth operation the criminals had pulled off at the Croft Mansion had left him uneasy, and pondering what move such a well-financed organisation would try next. He was almost certain it wasn't over. He took a long pull on the rich aromatic brew in his hands as he pondered. Specially imported from the Blue Mountain slopes of Jamaica, the coffee merchants he'd met while abroad in his younger days now kept him well supplied, for a price. He could not now bring himself to drink anything else, the Jamaican coffee beans being far superior to any others he'd yet come across.

Thunder again rattled the windows and thumped within Cullen's chest. He left the chaotic views of the window and headed over to his desk to once again scrutinise the still frame photographs, hoping against hope he might pick up_ something _worthwhile_. _Some minute detail previously missed, or something so bleeding obvious that no one had yet noted it. The thugs had been simply dressed in black, and had not bothered to cover their facial features; clearly confident their backs were covered somehow if they got caught on film. Damn odd, he thought, for such professionals to throw caution to the wind like they had. Either they weren't as good as they thought they were or – they had a trump card waiting in the wings to play if things got nasty.

Cullen picked up an Impreza camera shot that showed the hovering Eurocopter, and regarded it thoughtfully; a crack in the hardened plastic lens cover had marred the scene, but it still showed the glistening lines of the beast complete with full weaponry loadout. He might be able to call in some favours to see if one had recently gone missing, or make discreet enquiries about odd recent purchases. Cullen still had friends in high places within the military, but knew he could not lean on them too much to provide classified information. Still, he thought, it was worth a shot. One thing was for sure, anyone who could afford to send in a Eurocopter Tiger Attack Helicopter for a smash and grab operation were no small fry. He shook his head as he stared at the image, his mind sifting its details, knowing that Lara Croft had bagged a nasty adversary this time.

The desk lamp sputtered and went out.

_Knew it, _Cullen thought to himself. The power lines had taken all the torture they could stand and had finally given up the fight, unable to withstand Mother Nature's fury any longer.

Low power lighting came on and lit Cullen's office with a meagre yellow glow, and he heard the soft reverberations of the twin diesels in the basement as they cranked and smoothed their revolutions into a steady beat. All unnecessary electrical appliances would have to wait, silenced, as the generators now only supplied power to mission critical equipment. Withmore's operator's console for one, and the Foxhound network server racks another.

Lightening flashed again, imprinting brilliant white squares across the floor as the windows shaped the light. Crackling thunder boomed and shook the room again.

Cullen froze.

He was certain he'd heard breaking glass somewhere amid the racket.

_What the hell? _

He hit the intercom button on a small unit sitting on his desk, still powered by the generators. "Withmore? Did you hear that?"

A moment passed before… "Boss? You still here? You mean the thunder? Yeah I heard it. Shook the whole damn building! Suppose you know the power's out?"

"Generators have come on lad," Cullen replied. "I heard glass breaking Withmore, strange, as all our windows are reinforced. You didn't hear it?"

"No way boss, not down here. I gotta be pretty much dead centre of the building here at the console. You want me to check it out?"

Cullen didn't like it. Something within the depths of his war-tuned mind had set alarm bells ringing, convincing him that something was not as it should be. Was he being paranoid? War had side effects, he knew all too well, sometimes causing grown men to jump at shadows long years after they'd left the battlefield. Nevertheless…

"No lad," he replied calmly. "Get your bulletproof vest on and get your stunner. I'll meet you there."

"What?" Withmore shot back in askance. "Are you…"

Cullen cut him off, unease rising. "Now lad!" he stated firmly. "And don't move until I get there. Right?"

"Right," Withmore replied more seriously, knowing not to question his employer. "See you soon."

Cullen worked quickly. He hurried to a gunmetal grey cabinet along a side wall and fished its key from his pants pocket. With key inserted, the door swung open and Cullen immediately unhooked his own bulletproof vest, making haste as he fitted it over his wide-shouldered upper body and navy blue Foxhound polo shirt. Next came his personal Glock 20 pistol and several spare 10mm Auto cartridge magazines. The Glock 20 wasn't an overly popular weapon, operating in select circles only, but _was_ popular amongst security personnel the world over. Cullen made sure his staff had decent equipment, period.

The Glock 20's polymer construction felt cool to the touch as Cullen rushed on silken steps to the door of his office. He listened. The storm continued to rage, occasionally filling the darkened building with brief white-light flashes and the bulldozing crackle of angry thunder. Cullen could hear nothing else amongst the din.

His office door swung open easily and he moved into a dimly lit passageway, the low power lighting not quite up to the task of forcing back the shadows of night. Glock raised, he moved forward, and headed for the stairwell that led down to the lower levels. Though years retired, his soldier's senses had never chosen to depart, and some back corner of his mind still slammed the alarm button down, urging him forward to investigate.

The stairwell was lit with red emergency lights only, which were little more than guiding lights in the darkness. Cullen made a mental note to have them looked into later, as the stairwell was supposed to be an emergency escape route if the building found itself burning, or some other such catastrophe happened. Moving quickly, he dropped down several flights of stairs being careful to tread as light footed as possible, hoping to remain undetected, by whatever, or whoever had broken the glass minutes before. All glass in the building was reinforced security grade, added to that; all lower-level windows had high tensile security mesh on the outside. Somehow, damage from the storm didn't fit with his melding thoughts in explanation of the shattered glass.

Reaching Withmore's level, Cullen reached for the doorhandle.

He froze.

A noise he hadn't heard in a very long time now reached his ears and jolted sickening realisation to the surface, memories flooded back unbidden, of times long ago, of a crazed and smoking warzone. Processing events with speed, Cullen fought the urge to yell a sudden warning to Withmore and give his presence away. Unmistakable, was the skittering sound of a Flash Bang grenade as it tumbled across a concrete floor, somewhere on the other side of the door.

_What the hell?_

The time delay on Flash Bangs was usually short, Cullen knew. Somewhere between 1.0 and 2.3 seconds. All safeties on the Glock 20 came off in well-oiled precision. If Withmore was hurt, he'd brook no quarter for the grenade's owner.

Detonation.

The grenade exploded in a blinding flash of over one million candela and enough decibel power to cause inner ear disturbance and severe loss of coordination and balance. Nasty bits of work, Cullen knew from first hand experience, but he pushed the memories aside with a sheer upwelling of willpower, knowing his mind must be clear to execute his next move. The blinding flash blasted through the thin gap under doorway, throwing the concrete floor of the stairwell into seconds-lived brilliance. The door shook in Cullen's hands as pressure waves radiating out from the blast slammed into it from the other side. He counted to three.

A nanosecond had the door open and Cullen through it with fluid movements honed in the hell of war. The operations room was a chaotic mess and the metallic smell of the grenade's magnesium-based pyrotechnic charge hung in the air like a thick disease intent on obliterating all life. He could see Withmore's operators console, but could not see Withmore himself. He scanned the large area, divided by chest-high partitions in some areas, and floor-to-ceiling glass dividers in others.

All senses firing, Cullen quickly overstepped toppled debris to reach Withmore's console. Relief flooded his soul. Withmore was out for the count, lying haphazardly across the floor, but a quick check of his pulsing blood stream told him that Withmore was still within the land of the living. He'd be plagued by a nasty headache when he awoke though, and would probably have ringing in his ears for a day or two.

No chance existed to help Withmore further. A Cathode Ray Tube monitor sitting on a desk immediately next to Cullen exploded with the unmistakable sounds of gunfire and the popping bang of the monitor's disintegrating vacuum tube. Instinct took over and Cullen dropped to the ground for cover, cursing himself for being so careless. It was an obvious move to check Withmore's well being first, and the attacker had known it.

Heavily booted footsteps sounded out from the emergency-lit room, ruthlessly announcing the presence of the unknown attacker. From his position on the floor, Cullen noted the Raysun X-1 in Withmore's now loosely outstretched hand, never having had the chance to bring it to bear. Silently taking it, patting his employee's wrist in a fatherly manner as he did so, he shoved it into his navy blue pants, thinking it may present a better option than trying to kill or wound.

A glass office divider nearby disintegrated as another gunshot cracked out across the room, the crystalline pieces shattering to the floor in a high-pitched tumbling waterfall. Cullen immediately looked over toward it, but only briefly to solidify his thoughts on the attackers possible tactics. He moved, squatting in a duck walk, away from Withmore, where the attacker knew him to be, and up a walkway between partitioned sections before ducking into another small cubicle. If the scum had another grenade, then Cullen didn't want to be anywhere near it when it went off; he had to keep moving. He crouched, and listened. It was obvious that the attacker was attempting to scare or disorient him with his seemingly wayward shots, the glass screen, the monitor, all designed to flush him into the open for a clear, killing gunshot. But Cullen was having none of it.

A few moments of stalemate ensued, without a sound or move from either person.

Carnage began then, as the attacker stepped up his intimidation. Desks became upended and their contents clattered loudly to the floor, still more gunshots spewed from the attackers barking weapon, aiming at, and disintegrating still more of the glass dividers to great clamorous effect. Cullen counted the shots as they fired, almost certain the scum used a pistol of some sort. If that was the case, then a reload was imminent.

Silently, Cullen climbed atop the desk in the cubicle and crouched low enough so he could not be seen above the partition dividers, and waited. Cullen knew where the attacker was, his intimidating tactics having the unfortunate side effect of giving away his position in the large room. If the attacker had ever been a soldier, Cullen thought, they'd have surely known that. So, very likely they weren't military.

_Blam! Blam! Click!_

There it was. The attacker needed a reload.

Cullen stood like lightening atop the desk with Glock 20 outstretched, and searched only moments for his quarry, whom he caught fishing around in bulky clothing for a replacement clip. _Amateur!_ Bead locked, Cullen let fly.

_Blam! Blam! Blam!_

He made no body shots however, and aimed low on the attackers body, attempting leg injuries or a damn good scare if nothing else.

The attacker howled like a pained demon, and looked straight into Cullen's purpose driven icy stare only a moment before diving to the ground to take cover. That brief eye contact contained surprise, but was heavily mixed with the wide eyes of madness, and Cullen knew then that his foe was very dangerous indeed. Madness contained exactly _zero_ reasoned thought, and the battlefield had sent many good men spiralling down into its bedevilling clouded depths, his close friends included. The last thing Cullen needed was a madman in his office with a gun.

Hushed curses escaped pained lips, as the thug scrabbled on the floor out of Cullen's sight. He'd hit home with at least one bullet.

Silence came then, before heavy throated laughter drifted up through the gloom. Still standing atop the desk, a chill swept Cullen's body as he recognised the telltale signs of a madman who didn't care if he lived or died, life holding no value amid such wells of disillusionment. Cullen moved to step over the partition and onto the next cubicle's desk, but froze as a small object sailed through the air toward him.

_Jesus Christ!_

It was another grenade, and no Flash Bang this time; it's smooth exterior and pomegranate shape suggesting a fragmentation grenade of some type.

Cullen moved like a bat out of hell, knowing he had at best five seconds to get away and take cover, at worst, more like three seconds. He jumped from the desk back out into the passageway, and ran like the blazes for 10 or so steps, his legs driving him forward on a rush of pure adrenalin, then dove to the floor with ears covered.

_Boom!_

_More like three seconds, _Cullen thought.

Shrapnel exploded forth from where he'd been mere seconds before, ripping partitions to threads, turning desks to confetti and shattering a number fluorescent tubes in their light fittings up on the ceiling. The explosion rattled the entire room, sending thunderous reverberations through the floor and into any other solid object within forty-five feet of the blast.

Cullen was back on his feet within moments, heavily suspecting the demon-thug would be quickly coming to inspect his handiwork and finish the job if he found him alive. Quickly he ducked into another darkened cubicle with a view of the one now blown to smithereens, the emergency light above him having suffered terminal shrapnel damage. Crouching, he stilled himself to silence, and pulled the Raysun X-1 from his pants, but kept the Glock 20 secure in his other hand.

Cullen waited.

Moments passed in silence, before the heavy throated chuckling came again. And then the thug spoke.

"Peek a boo you asshole! Are you fucking _dead_ yet?" Madness dripped like a decaying stench from each ill-begotten syllable. "Bez is here to have some _fun_ you big man asshole!"

_Bez huh?_ Thought Cullen, secreted away in the shadows. _Come get your fun then you freak_!

The heavy-booted footsteps returned, albeit now sporting an irregular rhythm that suggested an injury of some sort, and sounding like a diseased zombie shambling through rubble with a payload of chaotic disaster to dispense. Bez was indeed coming to check on the hell he'd created, Cullen thought, no doubt hoping to find a shredded body to crow and gloat over to fuel his inexplicably rabid desires.

Before long the humanoid form of Bez appeared in the gloom, rounding a corner in the passageway with limping, but carefully searching steps. His face remained shadowed within the foul weather hood, and Cullen could only make out the barest hints of the features contained within, hidden from the light as they were. The dim lighting raised only the barest glint from the stainless-steel pistol entrained within Bez' bear-like grip, but it was enough to allow Cullen to identify it as a German made Sig Sauer. The Stainless-Steel slide of the weapon being required for the more powerful .357SIG cartridges it dispensed, which were lethal against human flesh.

Bez limped along the passageway with brief, quickly manifested searches of each cubicle he passed, whipping the Sig Sauer around into each as he did so. He reached the remains of the cubicle that had taken the full force of the grenade, where Cullen had been only minutes before. Finding it empty he paused a moment to kick the fallen partitions aside, then, realising his quarry was not there, he whipped the Sig Sauer around to cover the length of passageway he had not yet searched, looking lividly for his prey. He crouched a little and quickly moved to check the cubicles immediately adjacent, clearly a little off-put by the absence of his victim.

The stun probes of the Raysun –X1 had a range of six meters. Although Cullen could have shot the man dead with his Glock 20 from his hideaway in the darkened cubicle, he'd seen enough death to last twenty lifetimes already, and chose to try his non-lethal options first. Getting close enough to the fully armed madman to use the Raysun was the sticking point however, and the lethal option of the Glock 20 remained firmly grasped alongside the stun weapon. Bez' mad chuckle bubbled up through his phlegm-filled throat once again.

"Did you get cut up into little pieces asshole?" The words dripped with glee. "I want to taste your sweet blood! Where's your sweet blood? I can't see it! _Give it to me!_" The last words were demonic, seeming almost inhuman.

_Just a few more steps freak._

Bez took another step toward Cullen, his darkened hood sweeping around as he scanned the room. Another step, and he was scrutinising the debris on the passageway floor, eye's lingering on Cullen's dark hiding place. The Sig Sauer came down and trained directly on him, the madman also thinking the spot made a good hiding place.

_Shit!_

Another step and Cullen's grip tightened on both weapons, his body becoming rigid as he prepared to uncoil himself in the imminent endgame. Another step, and Cullen judged the freak to be on the precipice of the Raysun's fury; he sent a silent prayer to God, hoping like hell somebody upstairs was listening.

"Would you dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?" Bez intoned inexplicably with a low leering growl. "Would you dance with a demon if the price was right?"

_What the…?_

The madman leaned forward.

_Range._

Cullen exploded from the cubicle with the swiftness of a tightly coiled cobra. A gasp and slight stagger momentarily manifested through the madman's stance, as the shadows in the cubicle became a man, with two guns. In mid flight, Cullen pulled the Raysun X-1's trigger, having kept a bead trained on the man from the moment he appeared within sight. Twin probes shot forth with blinding speed, propelled on their way by compressed gas, and trailing light, tightly wound wiring behind them.

Bez was no slouch however, and surprise delayed his reflexes by no more than a whisper in time. The Sig Sauer sang it's deadly tune even as the stun probes were in mid flight; Cullen's blazing senses registered the hits to his body even as he crashed to the floor, still running on pure adrenalin.

Bez screamed like a tormented beast as the stun probes tore through his multiple layers of clothing and lodged in his chemically enhanced flesh, and delivered their 75,000 volt payload. His body convulsed and his hood ripped back as a flailing arm caught it amid the throes of the high voltage onslaught. A short burst from the stun weapon was usually enough to incapacitate even the hardiest criminal, sending them crashing to the floor without a single memory of the experience.

Bez bellowed and screamed as he flailed and twisted in a dance of electric fury, his blood rimed eyes bulging and swirling wildly amid his bald and heavily scarred face, but he did not go down. The Raysun would keep delivering the charge as long as Cullen held the trigger, or until the built in Lithium-Ion battery gave out. Never had anyone withstood such a stun weapons delivered voltage more than a second, or two at best, _ever._

Seconds ticked by in calamitous uproar. Cullen found himself awash with disbelief as recognition dawned within him that the Raysun was having little effect, its electric pulses only serving to enrage the freakish madman further toward the ravening beast he appeared to harbour inside. He let the Raysun's trigger go, and firmed his trigger finger on the Glock 20.

_Lethal it is then._

But his trigger pull never came.

A glass vial dropped to the floor and smashed, having fallen from somewhere within Bez' smouldering, bulky clothing. Immediately the spilled liquid contents began to fizzle and pop as the virulent deep-blue substance boiled and became airborne. It was the backup counter play that Cullen had no answer to, knowing with sure certainly he was in deathly peril; the boiling blue substance was surely poison, or a knock out gas of some kind.

The first acrid whiff of the malignant gas caused Cullen to choke and gag. His eyes began to water and his vision blurred as he squeezed off three shots from the Glock 20. Bez' rapidly blurring shape wheeled away and disappeared from view as he did so, the movements seeming miraculously fluid despite the onslaught just sustained.

Cullen was on his back amid the scattered debris on the passageway floor. He rolled away from the clandestine hissing gas cloud and attempted to right himself into a hastily concocted crouching stance in which to flee the vile expanding brew. He almost succeeded, but a vicious crunching blow pounded him ruthlessly between his shoulder blades from behind and sent him stumbling forward and crashing to the floor once again amid searing waves of demon-dealt pain. The soldier within him began to take charge, despite the debilitating attack, and within an eye-blink he'd rolled onto his back and again squeezed the Glock 20's trigger at the hulking humanoid shape bearing down on him. But again Bez wheeled aside even as the bullet spun toward him in mid flight. Cullen shook his head vigorously and rapidly blinked his eyes, trying hellishly to grope for clear vision, knowing the slug had missed. War-tuned instinct wrenched his body aside as the solid aluminium frame of a cubicle divider partition came smashing down beside him with the force of an atomic-bomb baseball bat, the whistling sound of the jagged metallic weapon whipping through the air as Bez swung it being what had alerted him. The impact rang furiously in Cullen's ears as broken wreckage blasted forth like shrapnel from the tortured detritus clogging the floor as the hammer-blow landed, the pounding of his own heart adding to the calamitous bedlam exploding forth around him.

Bez cursed at the miss. Cullen whipped the Glock 20 toward the demonic utterance and pulled the trigger again, noting his vision was returning, but also noting the acrid stench of the vile gaseous poison as it began to fill his lungs. Bez screamed his Hellpit scream and the Glock 20 was ripped from Cullen's vicelike grip as a heavy combat boot connected with the weapon and sent it cartwheeling into the bent chaos further up the passageway. Cullen cursed with stinging fingers, then kicked and lashed at anything he could gain purchase on in order to push himself away from the hideous beast hulking over him and the stinking gas cloud that had come along with it.

Cullen's eyesight had recovered, somewhat, to reveal the evil sneer of Bez' brutal bloodless face. A hand connected with a desk lamp in his wild backward scrabble over the floor on all fours, and he hurled it with all the strength he could muster at the inhuman beast stalking him down like pitiful prey. Bez easily ducked the flying projectile with a ruthless yell. "_Asshole!_"

Three quick lumbering steps, and Bez was picking up a solid black-leather office chair, as if it were paper, then, to Cullen's horror, hurled it with impossible force toward his exposed body. Cullen moved to intercept the chair with his own booted feet by raising his legs up defensively in an attempt to deflect it away, but misjudged the pure force Bez had put on the projectile and was a fraction late. The chair's backrest clipped his feet sending it pinwheeling end-over-end with deadly speed, the star-shaped base with plastic wheels attached wheeled over and slammed into his chest, driving the breath from his body, and cracking three ribs as they bore the brunt of the impact.

Cullen screamed a silent scream as his entire body fired with agony and tormented suffering, sending him wavering dangerously to the edge of consciousness. But the soldier within him fought back the sapping darkness and banished it to the shadows, refusing to allow it dominion over his besieged conscious thought and battered body.

Half stunned, he noted a large fluorescent light tube lying beside him, likely having fallen from its roof mountings during the grenade blast. Willing his control back amid waves of debilitating agony, he smashed one end of the tube by bringing his clenched fist down on top of it with frustration-driven fury. Glass shattered and shards stuck like burning splinters into his rock-hewn fist, but he hardly noticed.

Bez leered over him with a sickeningly triumphant grin, his bloodless features appearing zombie-like in the dull gloom of the struggling emergency lighting. "You cannot beat me _asshole,_" he rasped in voice of cut glass. "I am your superior and you will obey me, or you will die in hell! I will send you there. I know the devil well."

"Tell me something I _don't_ know you ripe turd!" Cullen rasped in reply through gritted teeth.

Bez clicked through his bent teeth in admonishment. "You are _nothing_ compared to me. You will learn your lesson _asshole_." He then raised his Sig Sauer and pointed it at Cullen with wide-eyed delirium.

"Sorry," Cullen gasped defiantly. "But I have other plans."

Bez frowned; perplexed at the indifferent display from the man he'd soundly beaten. Letting up the pistol, he moved in to deliver a stinging kick to the downed man for another lesson in pain, but Cullen moved first.

He simultaneously wrenched the office chair aside with one brawny arm while taking up the fluorescent tube beside him with his other hand. He whipped the glass tube around with the fluid grace of a Samurai warrior, pointing the jagged end toward Bez' leering face, and then jammed it toward him in a sit-up move with all the strength and speed he could muster. Bez reacted, but this time _he_ was the one fractionally late with his deflective move.

Bez stumbled backward and whipped his head away with a murderous howl of poisoned hate as the glass fluorescent tube caught the underside of his already-scarred chin and shattered, embedding stinging glass pieces deep within his facial flesh. The wounds were superficial at best, but delivered a solid dose of cutting pain, even registering through his drug-enspelled mind. Enraged, he turned back to deliver any killing blow he could manifest to the insignificant man who'd hurt him, but Cullen was gone.

Dripping blood from two gunshot wounds, one in the upper thigh, and another through his left side, Cullen limped through the chaos-strewn gloom, having used his hard-fought advantage to make good his escape. His cracked ribs knifed through each movement with shooting pain, his mind fogged with both the sickening poisonous concoction Bez had dropped, and also the evil stench of high explosives that still hung maliciously in the air from the grenade blast. Bez, Cullen pondered grimly, appeared to be some type of super human, having shrugged off several solid bullets and then still come at him with seemingly impossible strength and agility, and all that after 75,000 volts should have laid him out flat. He could only wonder what clandestine means Bez employed to achieve his inhuman endurance and strength, somehow though, he found himself really not wanting to know.

Cullen's Glock 20 was lost amid the debris, but he limped with purpose to the fire exit on the other side of the room, not caring about the noise he made as he manhandled drunken office furniture and cubicle divider walls aside to get past. The whole damn area was a jumbled mess anyhow, and Bez almost certainly knew where he was, with or without the noise of his passage. Bez scuffled somewhere behind him, no doubt in pursuit, but Cullen remained single minded, his movements filled with driven purpose.

Reaching the fire door, he paid no attention to the opportunity to escape; rather, his eye's fixed on the red metal box attached to the wall beside the door, and the words '_Fire Axe. Break glass in emergency_.' stencilled across its glass-covered front. Not exactly the damn emergency he had in mind when the axes were installed, he mused gravely, but a sick ravening madman was as good an emergency as any to put the axes to good use.

Wasting no time, Cullen smashed the axe box's thin glass with his clenched fist, and then reached inside for the 36-inch hickory handle of the American-made fire axe itself. Made by Fire Axe Inc, the axe had been _designed_ by firefighters, for _use_ by firefighters, and featured a six pound hardened steel head with a cutting blade at one end, and a five inch pick or 'poll' at the other. The axehead, like most such fire axes, had been painted red for high visibility amid the smoking chaos of a burning building, and could also easily cut through nails and other metallic fittings, thanks to the toughened steel material used in its construction.

Easily hefting the axe, Cullen made for the darkened alcove of a small kitchenette nearby, usually reserved for coffee making, heating lunches and other such mundane workaday tasks. The emergency light fitting hung from the ceiling in a tangled mess of wiring and contorted metal, explaining its darkened state immediately. Part of the mess Bez had made earlier on, Cullen thought, when he'd been trying to intimidate him out into the open. Again he stilled and waited for the madman's next move, fiercely attempting to clear his hazing thoughts, Bez evil mixture beginning to assert itself over his clear thinking mind.

There was no rapid pursuit however; Bez had not rushed after him like an enraged bull as he'd expected. Instead, muttered curses, heavy breathing, and the same heavy offbeat footsteps from before could be heard emanating from the direction of Withmore's operators console.

Cullen silently cursed.

Bez had outplayed him again, and he knew it with cold certainty. Withmore still lay defenceless, having being knocked unconscious by the Flash-Bang grenade earlier, and Bez had now moved on to the much easier target he presented. Having been almost certain Bez would chase him down instead, particularly after his act of defiance, Cullen found himself somewhat disquieted at the evilly scheming change in tactics. Revenge had seemed the logical path a madman thug might take, but it appeared Bez' mind worked differently. No doubt now existed in Cullen's mind that Bez would use the threat of Withmore's death to gain control of the situation, a ruthlessly simple tactic, without a shadow of a doubt, but one that he once again had no answer to. The damned hellspawn come humanoid might appear like a dull beast, he thought frustratedly, but Bez harboured an undeniably evil intelligence that made him an all the more deadly adversary.

Cullen's mind worked furiously, quickly shoving aside self-admonishment for allowing this thug to get the better of him, and set upon the complex problem of what his next move could possibly be. He moved silently from the dark shadows enshrouding the kitchenette, across the room, and into the passageway that led to Withmore's console. He knew that Withmore stood little chance of survival if Bez unleashed his pent-up madman fury on the unconscious man, and vowed that Withmore's death would be over his own dead body.

He froze as he rounded a corner and the operators console came into view. Icy tendrils of fierce dread snaked their way through his granite composure, his worst fears confirmed in a hellish nightmare.

Bez sat facing away from him at the console, seeming entirely nonplussed, and absorbed in something displaying on the large flatpanel screen in front of him. Withmore lay beside him, still out for the count, and sprawled haphazardly on the floor amid the clutter. Bez had roughly manoeuvred him to a position beside the operator's chair, and now held his unwavering Sig Sauer mere inches from Withmore's unprotected head, his intentions painfully clear.

Tapping a few keys at the console, Bez changed the contents on display, and began slowly scrolling through what he'd found. Cullen slowly sidestepped, attempting to also view what was keeping him so entranced. His mind worked overtime, knowing there was no telling what the vicious killer might do, or what he might be thinking. One false move could kill Withmore, Cullen knew with resolute finality, and he found himself at a complete loss as to what to do about it. The only course of action, though sickening, was to give ground and allow the killer what he wanted in return for Withmore's life.

A few moments passed in dread silence, before Bez chuckled.

"Pretty girl ain't she," he said with leering undertones, obviously knowing Cullen was watching. "I'm going to have fun with her too, Mr Cullen, right after I'm done having my fun here. You won't mind will you?" His face remained glued to the screen.

_He knows my damn name! _Cullen thought with icy dread.

He framed a cautious reply. "What choices do I have?"

"None!" The reply snapped back. "You _have_ no choices asshole! You now _obey_ me! I _control_ you! And I'm _telling_ you what I want!" Bez jammed his pistol into Withmore's skull to drive the point home.

_Think like a madman. Think like a madman!_

Cullen leaned a little more to the side, he could almost make out what Bez was looking at, it was one of their file photographs, a woman with blonde hair. Seething anger boiled within him as he recognised her identity, and vowed once again that his body would lie dead and cold before he'd allow the vile demon anywhere near her. Only recently added to their database, much to the leering delight of the madman, was the angelic face of Seheira Sahain, complete with all her private details. Home address, phone number, how secure her home was, _everything_ a killer needed to know. Cullen pushed back waves of revulsion at the thought of Bez smashing into her home and – he banished the image, it was too vile to contemplate, and made him almost ill.

Cullen took a heavily stacked gamble. "Pull that trigger, and you will die, _that_ I promise you. Touch the woman in that photograph, and you will die, even if I have to hunt you to the pits of hell and fight back Satan himself, you will cease to exist."

The words were solid cold steel, and held such powerful gravity that Bez' fingers froze over the console keyboard, seeming to give him momentary pause. His bleeding face turned to regard Cullen, expressionless, and devoid of emotion, the soft glow of the lit monitor throwing his features into stark, hard-bitten relief. Cullen expected a rage, but inexplicably, it didn't come.

"She will die before your face asshole," Bez intoned, as if musing on a lighthearted thought. "Nobody controls me. Nobody tells me how things will be. Not you, not even William."

_William?_

The Sig Sauer whipped up from Withmore's temple, and Cullen swore he could see down the inside of its gleaming stainless-steel barrel as Bez shifted the threat directly toward him.

_Getting somewhere: I think._

Bez slowly rose, eyes wide, and fixed on Cullen. "I'll make you, _and_ that Bitch William hates wish you'd done what I wanted. You will learn to _obey_ me asshole!" He pointed a scarred, waggling finger in Cullen's direction as he began to slowly step closer and close the distance between them. "Drop the axe, and start doing as I tell you."

_Come closer you freak!_

Suddenly Bez halted, inexplicably, and began to rummage though the thick folds of his clothing. His hand appeared again, and it held the unmistakeable form of another Flash-Bang grenade. He grinned with wolverine eyes and bloodless lips that appeared to slough from his face with wicked intent.

"I've got a present for you," he announced with razorblade glee.

_Jesus Christ!_

Cullen amassed all his remaining energy, becoming like a pent-up battering ram ready to strike, and threw the fire axe at Bez laughing zombie face.

Bez wheeled away, only a fraction late.

The Flash-Bang appeared at Cullen's feet, and he launched himself across the room, making desperately for a cubicle nearby. A blinding flash and flesh-ripping bang blasted behind him in mid flight, instinct had his hands to his ears and his eyes closed to protect them from the devastation. He crashed to the floor amid the sickening concussive blast, his head connecting solidly with a hard and sharp object, sending stars darting through his dark vision. He was in pain, and it built within him to a crescendo of darkness.

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**C**ullen's eyes flicked open. His thoughts were chaotic, screaming at him to get up. His arms were sluggish, and warm slick blood fouled his left eye like a sticky soup. With massive effort, he rolled onto his side and the room swam sickeningly. He willed the nausea away, desperate to check for the presence of the madman bent on using him as a punching bag. If he died now, so did Seheira Sahain, and possibly Withmore as well. And God only knew what Lara's fate might be if Bez had his way.

His cracked ribs felt like razorblades spinning around inside his chest cavity, and his ears roared with the explosive aftermath of the Flash-Bang. Drunkenly, he staggered up on one knee amid searing waves of nausea and searched for his assailant, wiping the blood from his eye as he did so. He spied the fire axe lying amid the rubble nearby, and reached for it, glad to have some manner of weapon to hand.

Bez was nowhere to be seen.

Cullen stood with faltering balance, his head fighting to control his body, and limped to where Withmore lay prone on the floor by the operator's console.

Withmore had a pulse; he was alive.

Another quick gaze around the area confirmed that Bez was no longer present. Cullen knew he must have been blacked out for minutes in the very least, and hoped like the blazes it hadn't been any longer than that. He reached over and slammed down a large, red circular button on the console, and sent a prayer to God that he wasn't too late.

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**A **mobile phone trilled and vibrated loudly in the hour preceding the predawn gloom. A muscular, and wide-shouldered man bolted upright from the confines of his military-issue sleeping bag and swiftly hooked up the offending device with nimble hands to regard it. A light sleeper, it only took him moments to become fully focussed. His eyes went wide; stunned at the message his Foxhound-issued mobile phone had delivered. He knew, with single-minded clarity, that something had gone terribly wrong.

He hooked up the handheld radio on the grass beside him. "Trevor!" he hailed urgently.

A short moment passed before, "What is it?" came back in reply.

"Touble!" Stan Forde replied. "Code zero, niner, eight! Class one emergency!"

"Zero nine eight – that's – _Jesus Christ_!"

"I'm with you partner! Our newest client!" Forde replied with iron resolve. "Stay here and guard the mansion, we've _got_ to keep it covered. This could be some clever ploy."

"Ten four. Will do. I'll see if I can raise some backup for you. Good luck, and raise hell."

Forde threw the radio down and dressed quickly with precision. A twenty year veteran, he knew how to hustle. He and Trevor Blake, another foxhound security man, were on assignment guarding the Croft Mansion and it's grounds. They'd set up a simple tent in the mansion gardens and were swapping shifts to keep Lara's home under constant surveillance. Malcolm Cullen, along with the rest of Foxhound, was deeply suspicious that her mysterious attackers were much more than they seemed, and was taking no chances. Forde also had deep-rooted misgivings about the whole affair, and worry mushroomed in the pit of his stomach for the safety of client zero nine eight. Somehow, he knew that she was in terrible danger.

He whipped up his mobile again, and tried calling her.

_"Come on," _he willed her._ "Answer!"_

He got half a ring, before the line went dead and he got the hang-up tone.

"Damn!"

He called her again, and got the 'disconnected' recorded message.

"No! No! No!" he yelled, jamming the phone into his tactical Foxhound trousers.

He bolted into the night, certain that Seheira Sahain was in deadly peril.


	7. Veteran's Riposte Part II

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**Can it really be a month since this little adventure went anywhere? Time flies.**

**As always, I really appreciate people who read and let me know what it is they like and don't like.**

**Raid on!  
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***5*  
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**Veteran's Riposte**

Part 2

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**T**he phone rang once, and then went mysteriously silent. Seheira's eyes flicked open at the intrusive noise, her sleep now light as the hour pushed on toward dawn. She had allowed herself to retire early that night after a perplexing day at the Croft Mansion spent searching the grand residence for anything out of the ordinary and taking note of damage inflicted by the thieves. Her current view to the world outside revealed a stormy scene, spirited wind gusts were pushing leafy branches against her bedroom window and made a noise like devil claws scratching and scraping at the glass as if attempting to get past the clear barrier. Only the faintest hints of an approaching dawn yet filtered through heavy grey clouds, their stored moisture still falling to Earth with softly spoken patterings on the pavement outside. As soon as Seheira turned from the scene to look at the usually-glowing lines of her digital alarm clock to discover the time, she knew that her modest Oxford townhouse had lost power, the clock's display now appearing darkened and devoid of life. Distant thunder rumbled and echoed through the chilled pre-dawn air, leaving her with little doubt as to what had caused the power's disappearance.

She reached for her mobile phone sitting on top of a small chest of drawers near the bed, and next to the now defunct alarm clock. The silver device was retro styled, being a shiny silver chrome in finish and having larger 80's styled buttons, but still being compact and discreetly pocketable. Why is it, she wondered inexplicably, that the world had to move and change styles so quickly? She tapped the wake-up button on the keypad and immediately noted her seven missed calls as the small screen illuminated. Dark eyebrows frowning, she noted her phone was still set on silent; done the previous evening after a nice but uninteresting fellow lecturer at the university had called and tried his luck at asking her out for dinner. After the second call she'd lost patience and silenced the phone for peace and contemplative quiet. However, the missed calls that showed weren't from the annoying puppy dog, rather, they had come from Foxhound Security.

As the realisation hit, Seheira quickly sat up in bed causing a cascade of honey-blonde hair to fall around her and drape across the plush blue-satin quilt cover. She noted the time of the last call had only been ten minutes ago, and knew that something must have gone seriously amiss somewhere for Foxhound to be so insistent in trying to call her, especially considering it had only just gone 4am. She had been added to the Foxhound client list at Malcolm Cullen's insistence, the old ex-soldier had seemed ill at ease since their meeting at the Victoria Arms, and had almost pleaded with her to come under Foxhound's umbrella of protection. She had to admit; there did seem to be something strangely chilling about the targeted break in at the mansion, and the following gunbattle that had put poor old Winston in hospital, not to mention Stanley Forde's partner.

Seheira reset her mobile to normal mode and, peeling the bedcovers aside, rose to get dressed, suspecting this day may also take an untoward turn. Had she known then how true those thoughts would turn out to be, she may well have booked a flight to Hawaii without a moments extra thought. Slipping on a pair of short grey gym shorts over her brief underwear, she wondered just what in the world could have happened, hoping against hope the calls were simply a mistake, or glitch of some sort perhaps. She was just in the process of removing her sky-blue y-back singlet top for something warmer when a wooden thump echoed through her Georgian-era townhouse, carried though the darkened rooms on storm fuelled drafts of chill air. Seheira froze, and let her singlet fall back into place, perplexed.

_What – the heck – was that?_

Stalking on bare feet to her bedroom door, she listened, but could only hear the wind gusts and the soft patter of falling rain through her bedroom window. The stairway leading down to her kitchen, garage, and living room was dark; she tried the light switch offhandedly, but with a sinking feeling knew the result would be darkness still. Listening a moment longer, and then setting her cascading hair back over her shoulders, Seheira began a cautious descent of the wooden stairway, but paused again as the old wooden boards creaked under her added weight, the noise seeming amplified in the near pitch darkness. Maybe the wooden thump from before was nothing, she thought, something to do with the storm and some piece of loose trash banging on – _something_. With the phonecalls from Foxhound though, and the strange events at the Croft mansion, she found herself inescapably on edge, and not quite able to believe such a simple explanation.

Her thoughts ended abruptly as glass shattered nearby, sounding like someone had almost certainly thrown a brick through her back door window. Following almost immediately came the noise of someone roughly rattling the doorhandle, probably reaching through the broken window to open the door from the inside.

_Oh Crap!_

Seheira knew she was in trouble; the icy realisation sending cold tingles throughout her slim figure. Someone was smashing their way inside; maybe coming after _her,_ and Foxhound had been trying to call and warn her of the threat. Disturbingly, it all began making perfect sense. The only question now being _who_ was coming after her and _what_ the hell did they want? Seeing as they were _breaking_ in, she thought, they probably didn't have it in mind to play nice.

Her mind shifted into self-preservation mode. Seheira knew she would have no escape if she became caught upstairs, her only option then would be a bone-breaking jump from her bedroom window to the garden beds below, which was a course of action she didn't exactly find palatable. The only other option wasn't exhilarating either, but offered at least a small glimmer of hope. Decision made, she quickly descended the remaining steps and ran in near silence to her kitchen and its array of heavy, copper-insert frying pans. Her aquamarine eyes scanned the pans for one that would make a decent weapon, pretty basic she thought, but better than nothing. She unhooked the biggest pan she had from its place on the wall by her cooktop and immediately tested its weight by holding it at the ready over her right shoulder and at head height. Top-heavy and unwieldy, Seheira knew the frying pan would require a decent swing to exact any damage, but she was determined, and refused to surrender meekly to this thug without a fight. It would have to do.

The back door crashed open and Seheira heard heavy-booted footsteps as they crunched over the broken glass on her hallway floor. Escape became her only thought, and she stalked on long aerobic legs through the doorway into her lounge-room and melted into the darkness within to wait. Her best hope, she knew, was to try for the front door as it opened directly out onto the street, then she could hopefully flag someone down for help or at least run for it as fast as her legs could carry her. The footsteps were irregular as they came closer, the intruder having a clearly discernable limp. Seheira felt oddly calm as she pondered the realisation, and the thought came to her that she might indeed be able to outrun the scum if things degenerated into a chase.

The break-in-bastard clicked on a torch of some description, and Seheira watched as the beam passed over the walls and benches in the kitchen across from her, perhaps making sure that nobody was hiding in the darkness. She knew that if she didn't move from her current spot she'd be made, and so crept up beside the doorframe leading into the kitchen and flattened her body against the wall, hoping to avoid the revealing lightbeam of the torch. She gave an involuntary shudder. The situation was not good, and Seheira knew that her chances of fighting off a determined hitman or burglar were slim at best. The frying pan was weighty, and had thick copper inserts meant for even heat distribution while cooking, but even so, Seheira doubted the mileage she would get from using it as a bludgeoning weapon in a firefight. She took a deep, silent breath with resigned calm, and held it at the ready. The next day's headlines flashed though her mind, '_Woman Defends Home With Frying Pan_'. Damn classic, she mused, shaking her head slightly at the bizarre turn of events. It all felt like some badly made B-grade horror movie.

Fossicking shuffles came from mere meters away as the intruder entered the kitchen and searched it for god knows what, probably _her_. The torch, with a beefy and scarred hand attached, appeared through the doorway and Seheira X-Rayed it with her intense aquamarine stare, noting its every move. More of the arm appeared while the torch scanned across her sofas and other lounge-room furniture, but just when it appeared the scum would fully enter the room, and with Seheira on the verge of unleashing frying pan chaos, the arm purposefully swung back through the doorway and on to other conquests. The bootsteps retreated back through her kitchen and into the hallway, having sensed no danger lurking in the shadows.

Seheira gave a silent sigh of relief, but remained in a heightened state of alertness. As smoothly as possible she edged around the doorframe and peered through the kitchen after the hulking shape of the criminal. He was a beast of a man, and even through the darkness Seheira could make out his thickset stance and bear-like arms; his head though, was shrouded under a dark heavy raincoat making any discerning facial features impossible to see. He was shining the torch up the stairs, and moved to follow after the beam with a creaking first step onto the old wooden staircase.

Paying the creaking steps no mind, the hulking figure disappeared into the stairway. Seheira moved quickly on delicately dancing steps. Moving through the kitchen she swiftly arrived at the staircase and again flattened herself against the wall, before flexing her upper body around the corner to try and catch a glimpse of the hellish brute. Seeing his back turned amid his thuggish silhouette in the storm-generated gloom, she slipped past the stairway on her smoothly silent steps and continued along the hallway, around a left-hander, and to the heavy solid-wood front door of her townhouse.

There was no way to open the solid oak door without making a noise. Silent doors, she mused frustratedly, weren't a feature of Georgian-era townhouses in Oxford. Her gym shoes were sitting on the floor next to the entrance, and she bent down amid falling blonde strands to collect them up. Hair flicked over her shoulders and down her back again as she stood, Seheira quickly tied the shoelaces together and strung the shoes over her right shoulder. Time to put them on was a luxury she simply didn't have.

Her townhouse held another secret, a garage, which had originally been a workshop of some type, a long-distant and previous owner having converted it for more modern purposes. Seheira had installed a remote-controlled garage door, and one with a decently strong construction at that. Because parked inside, was a fire-engine red 1988 Audi Quattro with barely twenty thousand miles on the clock. She loved the vehicle, the sound of its turbo-charged 2.2 litre engine, the glaring-orange liquid crystal instrument cluster, the smooth-throw of its five-speed gearbox, and most certainly the squarish lines of its Eighties heritage. It was _her_ type of car, and she could really put it to good use right now. However, its keys were safely locked away in her bedroom. Exactly where she _couldn't_ reach them.

Arms and shoulder muscles tensed resignedly, Seheira twisted the brass lock in the door, and created a seemingly calamitous noise that echoed through the old building like a pealing gong in the dead of night. There were three additional deadlocks holding the door closed, they were brass, and decidedly stiff with age. Her mind focussed, and pinpointing down on the task of escape she worked with speed and finesse on the old bolt-style locks, knowing the thug _must_ be hearing all the noise she was making. The deadlocks always had been stiff, and also frustratingly, were complete relics of a bygone era in home security. They were never meant to stop the homeowner escaping a malicious beast, Seheira thought ironically, they were supposed to keep the damn stupid beast _out! _

The last slide-bolt deadlock refused to move. Seheira rattled it with furious contempt, making more noise than a highschool slash band. It moved, a little, but only begrudgingly.

"Going somewhere sweet darlin?" a voice rattled in the darkness like a venomous rattlesnake.

Seheira froze to granite, and slowly turned to see a hellish bleeding man behind her, illuminated by the slate-grey light coming in through the window above the door. His hood was now thrown back to reveal a nightmare of a face, which bled freely from several lashes and cuts that would have most people doubled over in furious pain. He grinned amid a repulsively sloughing and zombified face with crooked teeth and bloodless lips, leaving Seheira with no doubt the man was a dud at the next beauty contest. Evil poured from the man in gushing waves, and his intent was inescapably plain. She shuddered, but inwardly refused to submit.

"Your father must have been a devious man." Seheira offered stonily. Clinical psychology 101 taught that troubled individuals often had trouble with parents, so she tried the gamble.

"No idea _who_ the bastard was _darlin._" The voice putrefied forth with satanic syllables that poisoned the air with insanity. "Don't give a shit either, he can rot in hell for all I care. But tell me sweet darlin, would you dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?"

Seheira realised the man was seriously disturbed, her clinical psychologists mind came to the fore and she heavily suspected a tangled dysfunction was manifesting within the brute's mind, twisting and turning it into an unreadable mush. Not that it was exactly hard to pick up the man was deranged, she thought with strained humour, he _exuded _madness.

"Would we be doing the Foxtrot or the Tango?" she replied carefully light-hearted, as she again put covert pressure on the stubborn deadbolt, willing it to move.

"The dance of death _darlin!_ The beautiful dance of death. Come, let me show you the steps." He took an authoritative step forward as the words spilled forth.

Seheira firmed her grip on the frying pan. "The voice in your head is lying you know," She impressed upon him then, trying another angle in an attempt for more time.

His ghoulish grin widened with impossible malice, and a scarred finger came up to point into his repugnant head. "Fully corrupted darlin! _Just_ the way I like it! Him and me get along just fine. If the lies are good then who the hell cares?" Another step forward and he was getting too close for comfort. "Would you dance with a demon if the price was right?" He added with hate-filled tones of lecherous intent.

"Some things just never come on sale," Seheira countered in unbending tones. She kept a level stare aimed squarely at his bulging drug-induced eyeballs, all the while adding increased pressure on the deadbolt behind her, rattling it slightly. The deadbolt wasn't moving however, causing an inward curse of frustration, and she made a mental note to damn well oil it when all this was over, _if_ she ever lived to tell the tale. No panic rose up to foul her inner calm, an oddity, she thought briefly, considering the brute had basically threatened to kill her. "Why do you want me dead?" she fished, knowing she was at peril's gate.

"Fun!" he shot back with dripping words of madness. "Death is me! I _am_ death! _I _hold the power and _you_ are _nothing!_ You are now _mine_!" His pointing finger shot toward her, jabbing the air with each stressed word.

Seheira swallowed, the man was too far within the clutches of madness to reason with. "Sorry," she said with stonily calm bravado. "But no man owns me. Not you, not your corrupt head, and certainly not that foppish git at the university who keeps asking me out! No man will _ever_ own me!" The ferocity and power behind her words was indefatigable, even causing a questioning thought in her own mind as to where such commanding conviction had come from.

The thug seemed not to hear, or care a damn for what she'd said. "Would you dance with a dominator by the glinting river?" he asked with calmly laced viperous words.

The situation wasn't getting any better, and Seheira knew she was trapped like a caged bird before a cannon with fuse lit, and no avenue for escape. She gave the deadbolt a hefty rattle as the last words left the dead lips of the brutish attacker, hoping like the blazes it would submit to her will. It didn't.

Time slowed, Seheira's inexplicably calm centre remaining steadfast. Something she would later ponder with bewilderment.

Mere steps separated her from the ravening malicious beast, and she could see each disgusting detail of the subhuman man-esque creature standing before her, crouching, as if coiling to strike. She noted for the first time that he was dripping blood to the polished wooden floorboards, a reasonably steady stream by the look of it, now accumulating in small pools at his feet. The injuries were not bothering him in the slightest, it seemed, and only added to the aura of malice the man carried and directed toward her. His eyes were fixed on hers, and he seemed to pay no heed to the hefty frying pan Seheira gripped with her aerobically fit arm and right hand, only God knew what he was thinking.

With seemingly impossible speed for such an injured man, the thug lunged at her with grabbing hefty arms and the rotting stench of evil malice. Seheira knew the move was coming however, having sensed it from the way the man stood, and from his riddled manifesto of garbled sanity. Her left hand joined with her right to grip the solid meatal frying pan, her shoulder muscles corded and tight amid her open Y-back singlet, and she unleashed the pan in a powerfully swinging arc that rushed through the air with driven purpose. The thug only had eyes for his angelic prize however, and never flinched, never seemed to register the stoic ferocity of the prey he thought would weakly submit. She appeared more like a fashion model, an angel without wings, a butterfly in the breeze, rather than a righteous fighter.

The illusion was shattered as Seheira's furiously full-blooded swing connected sickeningly with the side of the thug's lecherous head. His arms had been outstretched to take her in a death embrace, and had not offered any defence against her adroitly shaped attack. The noise was crunching cartilage and cracking bone, the pan resonated in her hands with the solid hit and spun sharply within her grip, but she kept a solid handhold on the faithful utensil as it delivered the hammer-blow.

Devil screams shattered the gloom as the thug fell back howling like a ghoulish wolf. His arms swung wildly in searching arcs as he dropped to his knees and fell over backwards onto the floor with a rumpled, wooden thump. Seheira flexed her body aside as the initial blows sought her out. Caught in the follow through of her attack, her balance and position required expert control as she stretched herself to the limits of possibility, but her agility exerted its control and she remained cat-like on her feet while avoiding any punishing hits. As the brute lay howling on the floor, Seheira immediately re-balanced with small dance-like steps and turned her attention to the stubborn deadbolt on the door. She positioned the bolt handle outward, and then swung at it with the frying pan, a yell of exertion escaping her lips as she crafted the blow in mid swing.

The bolt moved. Seheira's hammer-blow jolting it open with a loud metallic ringing as the frying pan sang out with the repercussions of the hit. With a quick glance behind her, Seheira noted the thug drunkenly sitting up and attempting to stand, his eyes driving mental daggers straight through her beating heart. She found she had little sympathy for the demonic brute before her, but found herself sorry for the innocent little boy he must have once been, before corruptive evil became his life. Her finely shaped hand shot to the door handle and twisted it, finally releasing the door to swing open and reveal the muted grey light of the stormy dawn.

Without a further backward glance, Seheira bolted into the freedom of the outside world, making sure her gym shoes still hung on her shoulder, and keeping a death grip on the pan which was still her only weapon against the brute. The street was glassine with fallen raindrops, making it seem slick and resinous as the struggling dawn light raised reflective patches across it's shining surface. The streetlights were darkened, just like her townhouse had been, and deep shadow still clung to the various buildings and alcoves along the street, seeming all the more ominous on this particular morning. Light misty rain was falling, soon making Seheira's arms and legs wet to the touch and filling her long, flailing hair with minute beaded water drops as she fled, sprinting away from her doorway like a graceful gazelle. She needed distance, as much as possible, between her and the hellspawn at her back.

Glancing back to the open doorway of her home, Seheira caught sight of the madman as he dashed into the daylight and stared her down with bedevilled eyes of tyranny. His movements seemed fluid. _Impossible,_ she thought. He was bleeding and badly wounded. How was it possible the wounds weren't slowing him down? Shouldn't he be falling dead? Or _something?_ Before turning her head to navigate, she saw him begin to run after her with astonishing energy, the limp seeming to have no effect on the speed he could somehow manifest.

"_Bloody crap!"_ she breathed with strained surprise. Who – or _what_ the hell _was_ this impossible demon?

Seheira was fit, and no stranger to the rigours of running, it was part of her weekly fitness routine and she settled into a hard, driving rhythm as she pelted along the deserted asphalt street. She could run a long time if needed, her trim and aerobic body had been moulded and shaped by a lifetime of sports and fitness routines that put many sports men and women to shame. Yet she never went overboard, and preferred to be able to fill her cocktail dresses in all the right places without resorting to padding or other such measures. The result was an hourglass figure with refined curves where there should be some, and toned where other women might show excess.

Reaching an intersection devoid of any early morning traffic, Seheira dashed right and bolted toward the grounds of the university, knowing it backwards, she hoped to bolt through it along an inexplicable path and lose her pursuer amid its many hidden pathways and close-quarter buildings. She glanced over her shoulder again, hoping to see a lead of some sort opening up between them, but her heart sank as she noted the shambling demon appeared to be keeping pace with her. Iron resolve lit within her like a brilliant beacon of willpower, and she drove harder, schooling her breathing and smoothing her gait yet more for extra speed.

Suddenly, her mobile trilled. Having been shoved unceremoniously into a small pocket in her snug-fitting gym shorts in the dark earlier. Seheira had completely forgotten it, and became almost shocked when its familiar ring tone sang into her consciousness. Smoothly she extricated it from her pocket as she ran, and bipped the answer button.

"Hello?" she said into it, entirely too harshly.

"Seheira!" a voice called back to her, flooded with pent-up worry. "It's Stan Forde! Where are you?"

"I'm a little busy to take calls," Seheira answered tensely. "I'm pelting down Sackhall Street with a demonic madman after me!" Suddenly, two gunshots cracked through the dawn and whizzed by her, ricocheting off the wet pavement somewhere ahead of her. "And he's shooting at me!" she added with indignant anger.

"Try and lose him!" Stan willed her. "I'm five minutes away! You can do it Seheira!" His worry for her wellbeing bled freely and was clearly evident through his imploring plea.

Seheira cut left and dashed into the dripping–wet confines of an old cobbled alleyway, knowing the pathway twisted and turned amongst hidden taverns and whitewalled townhouses. "Doing my best Stan!" she replied gamely terse through her rhythmical breathing patterns. "I don't suppose you could pick me up?" she asked then. "Say in five minutes? We can go for an early morning drive together?" Through the phone Seheira could hear the squealing tyres and roaring gearshifts as Stan thundered toward her, extricating every ounce of speed he could get out of the Foxhound Impreza. It gave her hope and steeled her resolve yet more.

"It's a date!" Stan replied, buoyed by her undented spirit. "But you need to stay alive damn it! Stay on the phone, and tell me where you're headed! I'll find you!"

"You better!" Seheira replied with a trace of mocking humour. "Or else," she breathed deeply, "I'll send a nasty letter of complaint to your employer! Ok I'm running up Blythe alleyway, coming up on Strakehall Street!"

Clomping boots echoed off the walls and garden fences around her, pressing home the point that her Devil-driven attacker was still close by. Amid three further gunshots, raising splashing geysers from puddles and sending plaster flying from old walls as they ricocheted around her, Seheira reached the end of the alleyway and cut right with the fluid grace of a competition dancer, her thick mane of honey-blonde hair trailing energetically in her slipstream. A small wooded park was ahead of her and she bolted for the shadowed cover of the trees within, but knew she would be hard pressed to get there without fending off some extra bullets. The frying pan hindered her movement somewhat, throwing her balance off kilter, but without it she was defenceless, and that was a situation she wanted to avoid at all costs.

The misting rain was dampening her clothing, causing her singlet top to cling like sheening swimwear, but it could do nothing to dampen her spirits, and she dashed onward with un-killable fury. True to her worst fears, the madman unleashed another bullet, the wooded park now frustratingly close ahead, but not quite upon her. The bullet whizzed like an angry insect and thudded into the pavement at her heels, sending concrete shrapnel splintering off to assault her pumping calf muscles, it felt like a hundred ants had bitten her all at once. Another gunpowder crack and she felt something whiz perilously close to the side of her midriff, but she couldn't spare the time to investigate.

The wood was upon her, and she angled past the first tree trunk and immediately bolted behind the second. Then she angled left and half dove, half ran, behind a line of low shrubs that formed a hedge leading to a central lake in the park. Crouching below the top of the hedge, Seheira ran as quickly as her adrenalin fuelled legs would take her, but she found herself hampered by the awkward stance. Crashing noises of snapping branches and trampled sodden leaf litter spewed forth from behind her, and she caught the hulking, beastly silhouette of the madman chasing her down as she whipped her head around to check on his whereabouts. He was close, too close for comfort.

Seheira bulldozed her way mercilessly through the hedge, using the frying pan as a battering ram to move the shaped foliage aside, but picked up scratches and needling skinpricks despite her best efforts. She couldn't stop. Her bare feet began to protest at the harsh treatment and unforgiving terrain of the fallen sticks and nuts on the ground around her, and she found herself wishing with a passion that she could at least stop and put on her gym shoes, now flailing wildly as they hung over her shoulder. Seheira bolted along the other side of the hedge a moment, but then cut across to a small thicket of thinly-trunked trees as she desperately tried to alter her course and outwit the pursing hell-man now perilously close behind her, relentless, in his charging fury of destruction.

"Talk to me!" Stan called to her from the phone in her sweating granite grip.

"Busy!" Seheira replied with tension rising. "In Strakehall Wood! He's running me down Stan! I can't get away from him!"

"Just hold on Seheira!" The Impreza's engine revved wildly amid screeching and surely smoking tyres. "I'm there! I'm nearly there! Another minute!"

But it was a minute that Seheira didn't have. The hulking shape of the brute crashed through the hedge off to her left and bellowed like an enraged bull. Seheira bolted away from him but noted immediately her course was taking her deeper into the wood toward the central lake. Stan wouldn't be able to find her, she knew with no shadow of a doubt, if she continued tracking toward it. Decision made, she adroitly angled right, weaving amid the tree trunks as she went, and began circling around toward the edge of the wood, but lost precious lead distance in the process as the madman moved to cut her off. Seheira willed herself to run faster, but a tree root, looping up out of the fallen leaves, snagged her bare foot and sent her crashing down to the wet and earthy ground, driving the breath from her lungs as she thumped heavily into a sodden pile of waterlogged leaves. The mobile phone and frying pan went spinning from her grasp, and out of reach.

Seheira rolled over immediately, intent on getting back up and getting the hell away. But the ravening madman was upon her, pointing at her with an outstretched arm and jabbing finger.

"Bitch!" he yelled through raggedly rasping lungs. "Nobody escapes Bez! Right!" He jabbed his finger at her again to enforce the viperous point, his slick zombie face pure bedevilled anger. "Got it?" A pistol appeared as his other hand rose up next to the pointed finger, leaving Seheira with no doubt she was in desperate trouble this time.

"Why do you want me dead!" she shouted at him with pure feminine force. "Are you truly _sick and twisted?_ Or has someone put you up to it?" She may as well know her true killers name, she thought, if she was going to die.

Bez grinned a sloughing grin of pure evil. "I want my fun little sweet _darlin _it's true," he grated in reply, breathing heavily. "But ain't me that wants you dead. That'll be old William Cortez." His eyes gleamed as he said the name. "He's a dangerous son-of-a-bitch there's no doubting. But he's good to me. Let me have a little _fun_ tonight. But he's a better killer than me, and very smart, so you _don't_ want to make him angry." He laughed a phlegm filled laugh. "But I suppose you already _did_ that eh little _darlin?_"

Seheira knew the frying pan was behind her and out of reach; it was no good to her now. "What the _hell_ did I ever do to _William Cortez?_" she threw back at him in defiance. "I've got no idea who in _God's_ name you're talking about!"

Bez leered and pounced like an overweight cat to stand mere inches from Seheira's scrabbling feet as she attempted to push away over the sliding leaf litter. "That other _bitch_ William hates!" Bez angrily spewed out. "Lara something, or whatever! You made a big mistake when you got to know her!" Bez' yellowed and bent smile returned, and he jammed the pistol toward her as if stabbing a wounded beast. "You will wish you'd never met her! I'm going to make sure of that sweet little _darlin! _You _pathetic_ _bitch!_ You belong to _me_ now!" The words had barely left his rotting mouth when he quickly squatted and caught one of Seheira's flailing ankles within his drug-strengthened grip, a look of purely evil utopia manifesting his features as he did so.

Seheira yelled in riposte as loudly and as defiantly as she could, throwing the full force of her fit lungs into the fray, hoping that _someone_ might hear her impassioned struggle. With her free leg she rained blows on the stinking hulk now attempting to pull her toward him, knowing she was minutes away from whatever disgustingly hell-bent desires he harboured. She landed a hefty blow to his neck, and another square on his slick and bleeding jawline, but they seemed as insect bites to the unstoppable lust and glee of the madman, each hit raising barely a grunt or any form of annoyance from his twisted mind. Eventually, after several additional glancing blows, he caught hold of her attacking foot mid-delivery, and held it within a vice-like death grip.

"You stinking rutting rhinoceros!" Seheira yelled with hate at his evilly triumphant face. "You belong in Hell! You and the cesspit voice in your head!"

Bez laughed with glee. "No argument there d_arlin!_" he said with menace. Then he stared directly into her fiery aquamarine eyes, and lusted at the wells of anger he found there, all just for him. "Tell me _darlin,_" he asked her then, after a leering pause. "Would you dance with a God, when the wind made you _all_ but shiver?"

"You belong in an asylum!" Seheira cut back at him, struggling mightily and trying to wrench free.

Bez pulled her in closer, and placed a rough hand on her smooth and tensed thigh. "Would you Dance with a panther down the promenade? Would you dance with a madman who had a purple hear –"

The frying pan whizzed from nowhere and caught him square on the forehead with a resonating metallic clang, cutting off his words without mercy. "Hey butthead!" said the newly arrived voice of Stanley Forde, a deadly look of reckoning chiselled across his roguish features, as he levelled a Remington 1100 tactical shotgun mere meters away from Bez' hell-begotten head. "Didn't your sick and twisted mother ever tell you how the ladies _ought_ to be treated?"

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**B**ez' face appeared truly hellish as it twisted into a silent scream of thwarted and disbelieving pain-driven fury, his eyes bulged impossibly, and the Sig Sauer went flying through the air as his hands whipped up to clutch at the frying pan's impact point, which now resembled a seeping mush of angry flesh above his right eyebrow. Forde watched with morbid fasciation as the savage madman let Seheira go and overbalanced backward with a moment of misted clarity across his un-naturally demonic eyes. Bez' open-mouthed and silent appeal to the leaden sky as he fell flat on his back seemed as if he beseeched power from some hidden demon, and it made Forde's skin crawl.

Seheira rolled away from the madman the second his grip was loosened, and then spun around gymnast-like into a crouching stand, her eyes filled with fervent purpose and relief at her timely escape, giving Stan a look of gratitude that spoke volumes.

Forde immediately rushed up beside her, concern etched into his roguish looks. He looked her over with military precision to check for injuries, but found none except for a precision cut in her blue singlet top at the side of her midriff, a small line of blood highlighting the scrape. Bullet injury, of sorts, he knew without a doubt. He saw no fear in her eyes, but noted instead their deep aquamarine fire of resolute spirit. She was wet, a bit ragged, and had fallen leaves sticking in her flowing hair, but, he thought, she could still have won a beauty contest.

Knowing Seheira was not hurt, Forde quickly turned his full attention on the scrabbling madman, who was coming back to his senses and was in the process of rolling over to get up.

"Freeze you rutting rhinoceros!" he yelled at Bez with a tone that meant business, and a slight conspirative smile aimed at Seheira.

"Stan, careful!" Seheira exclaimed from beside him. She was half bent forward with her hands lodged above her knees. "He's freaking crazy, demented, and high on some sort of performance enhancing drugs!" She breathed a quick recuperative breath. "And hello, by the way," she added, giving him a quick look before turning her attention back to the madman. "He's been bleeding like crazy ever since he broke into my house, and it hasn't slowed him down one bit."

"No kidding? Remind me to knock first if _I_ ever come visiting," Stan replied with a half grin, keeping his eyes locked on the menace.

"What?" Seheira shot back. "No wait! _I_ didn't do that to him! Well – I only hit him once with that frying pan and – "

"Shut up you _PIGS!"_ Bez roared, viciously cutting off Seheira's words. "_Nobody_ tells me what to do! You maggots will bend to _my _will! You will do what _I_ say!" His bloodied hands left his weeping face and he pointed forcefully at them both. "You will both _pay_ for your lack of submission! For your lack of respect! Get on your knees the both of you and _pray_ I kill you both quickly!" The last sentence was strewn with chaos and maniacal threat.

"The _gun_ says otherwise _butthead!_" Stan fired straight back at him. "Piss me off any more and your metal content will rise _dramatically!_ Got it? So stay down and shut up!"

Bez grinned and laughed with blood bubbling and gurgling in his throat. "You _pathetic_ British fool. You and the pretty _darlin_ will die, along with that _asshole_ back at your office, sure as the sun rises. Old Bez will see to that." He waggled the pointing finger, as if nonchalantly highlighting something mildly interesting. "Tell me though, now it's a party with three of us and all. Would you dance with a spirit, in the walk of life?"

"What in God's name?" Stan began after a short pause, perplexed. "You really _have_ gone off the deep end!"

Seheira straightened, and regarded Forde with a no-nonsense cautionary look. "His head is _seriously_ in a mess Stan, trust me, we need to be careful." She folded her arms, thinking, and then continued. "I've read about cases like this in medical journals. It's rare, thankfully, but not unknown. He hears at least one voice inside his head, probably telling him what to do, or suggesting it, and he gets off on dominating people with whatever brutal methodology comes to hand. If you aren't submissive, if you aren't meek, he doesn't like it and he'll get mad. _Very_ mad."

Forde sidestepped smoothly around the glaring madman, and bent down to pick up the Sig Sauer pistol that Bez had flung away in reaction to the pan strike, his eyes never shifting from the hellish maniac. "So he's a class-A insanity ward case then," he replied. He shoved the pistol deeply inside a pocket in his tactical trousers before returning his hand to the Remington to help steady it. "Lucky the big boss man is on his way here with backup as we speak. I'm pretty sure he also mentioned something about a straightjacket and someplace he'd like to shove a fragmentation grenade."

"Maybe we should tell Malcolm to bring an armoured truck as well," Seheira suggested, scheming thoughtfully. "I heavily suspect this weirdo runs through brick walls for laughs."

Bez chuckled. "Too _late_ you preening fools! _My_ help has arrived first!"

Stan and Seheira shared a puzzled glance, before automatic gunfire raked across the ground nearby.

Stan reacted instantly. "Take cover!" he shouted, almost willing Seheira to avoid a bullet. "Get behind a tree! There's a gunman at the edge of the wood!" He pointed in the direction he'd caught a human silhouette in the corner of his eye, for Seheira's benefit.

Seheira needed no further prodding, and spun away to bolt for the nearest tree trunk only a few meters behind her. Along the way, she bent down to scoop up the frying pan from its resting place amid the leaf litter and fallen twigs. Once again she had the undeniable feeling she may need to call it into action, and not as a cooking implement either.

Bez rose menacingly, a look of pure-evil ecstasy written over every feature he possessed. Forde knew their situation had changed instantly for the worse, and that he and Seheira were now the ones on the back foot. He watched with cold fury as Bez' demeanour changed from caged animal to that of an arrogantly supreme ruler, clearly also knowing the situation had swung his way again. Somehow, Forde thought, he needed to even the odds back their way again, but refused point blank to become a cold-blooded killer.

Bez charged at him like a wounded bull at a gate, a hellish gurgle escaping his mouth as he did so. Forde dodged the charge with a sideways leap of years-trained agility, despite his already-bandaged forearm and thigh, and unloaded single shotgun shell into the left boot of the charging monster, hoping at least to slow him down by some small measure.

Leaves and grass leapt skyward in small explosions as another line of automatic gunfire strafed across the ground perilously close to Forde's own booted feet, and he immediately dived left to avoid the threat. Bez screamed and bellowed as he fell back to the ground sitting, and clutching his lower leg with pain-strewn fury. It was the small break Forde needed to make good his escape, and put some distance between himself and the off-the-planet madman.

With a few running steps Forde reached the cover of a Grey Poplar trunk and flattened himself against it, then searched across to where Seheira also had the cover of a sizeable Silver Birch, and had just finished putting on her gym shoes. Their eyes locked and she signalled to him with a curled middle finger around to her thumb, letting him know that she was ok. Forde did the same signal back to her, and then pointed to the edge of the wood, signalling the direction they needed to go. Seheira nodded in understanding.

She waited for Forde to make the first move, and then followed after him as he dashed from cover and ran from tree to tree, pointing the Remington at each patch of shadow as he went. The wind had whipped up again and was causing strands of Seheira's long and freefalling hair to play and animate as she ran with purpose toward the edge of the wood, but she had no time to curb it's free spirited frolicking. Caught mid-flight between trees, she suddenly saw the phantom gunman as he broke cover and fired another menacing line of wildly aimed shots in their general direction. Seheira scrambled and made double-time for the Beech she had in her sights, the considerable cover of its grandmasterly-appearing trunk being what drove her toward it.

Stan was closer to the gunman than she was, and unloaded two shotgun shells with deadly aim toward the shadowed human silhouette, which seemed to melt away even as the first shotgun shell ejected from the Remington and arced through the air to the leaf-littered ground below.

"Seheira!" Forde then yelled across to her. "Run for the car! Now! I'll follow you up!"

Seheira once again didn't need any further convincing, and wheeled away from the Birch and pelted for the edge of the wood with all the driving speed she could muster. After a considerable effort of flight, she suddenly found she could see unhindered the low hanging clouds in an open and grey sky, and realised she was in the open with the wood behind her. She quickly looked around for the foxhound security car she knew Stan must have driven to the wood, but all she saw was a black Mercedes with equally blacked out windows. She cursed under her breath and quickly combed wind-driven honey-blonde strands from her eyes as she searched, but Stan's Impreza was nowhere to be seen.

"Behind you!" yelled Forde's sorely pressed voice from the darkened confines of the wood. Another series of booming shots then echoed off the buildings nearby as Forde unleashed the Remington in another tirade of covering fire.

Seheira spun around and pelted for all she was worth. She could hear Bez bellowing from the wood, along with the peppering shots of the automatic rifle the phantom gunman unleashed. She pushed herself harder, ruthlessly gaining extra speed from her slim frame. She ran beneath a large and sprawling Weeping Beech tree, which sat somewhat separated from the wood at the edge of the park, its long and green tendril-like branches swaying in the spirited wind. The moment she passed through the Beech's drooping curtain of green branches she spied the Impreza parked against the kerb of the road that ran around the park, and sprinted the rest of the way to its driver's door, hoping to Mother Mary that Stan had left it unlocked and the keys in the ignition.

The door opened and the keys glinted invitingly in the muted storm-created gloom. Seheira worked quickly. Throwing the frying pan into the rear seats, she almost vaulted into the drivers seat up front, and lost no time in bringing the turbo-charged engine to life. An angry growl of exhaust gas erupted from the high performance engine as she stomped a little too much on the accelerator, but, she thought, at least Stan would now know she had the Impreza in action. She slammed the door closed and stomped the clutch with her sneakered foot, still smarting from the shoeless sprints over all the terrain types from the park to her front door. She shoved the stubby sport-shift gearbox into first.

The Impreza shot forward with the force of a purebred stallion, and Seheira thundered the vehicle to the point where she had emerged from the wood, close to where the black Mercedes was also parked. Immediately Forde emerged from the shadows in a dead run, sprinting madly toward her, and pointing the Remington back behind him for defensive fire. A freezing chill coursed its way down Seheira's spine as Bez, impossibly, bulldozed with maniacal limping speed into the open as well only moments behind him. And then, as if to drive salt into an open wound, the phantom gunman was next to appear, fumbling madly with a spare clip as he tried to drive it home as he ran. Seheira, with dread rising, felt helpless, as she had no idea what she could possibly do to help Stan out, so she made damn sure she was ready to go the instant he was in the door.

Suddenly he was there, wrenching the door open and fiercely willing her not to fall apart with his purpose-driven stare. She didn't disappoint, and the moment Forde's behind hit the leather passenger seat, she dumped the Impreza's clutch amid the throaty revs of its engine and they jolted from the mark with a squeal of stressed rubber.

Immediately the rear window disintegrated amid a fusillade of hell-bent fury as the phantom gunman unloaded his new clip into the Impreza's rear as they fled. Shots hit the dashboard, sending splinters of shattered plastic spinning across the cabin space like shrapnel. Seheira looked into the rear vision mirror briefly with fired aquamarine eyes and caught sight of both Bez and the phantom gunman wrench open the doors of the black Mercedes. Clearly, they were not about to let her and Forde just drive away without a fight.

"That was too freaking close for comfort." Seheira said as she worked the gearbox higher.

Stan breathed heavily, and regarded her. "You said it compadre! Those two back there have _serious_ issues. Someone must have stolen all their toys when they were kids, and now they want payback, or _something!_"

"Or they're both whacked on drugs," Seheira replied.

"Probably both," Stan offered, with a shake of his head. "Are you alright?" he asked then. "You're wet through and you're not exactly dressed for the occasion."

Seheira smiled a coy smile. "Never question a woman's wardrobe. Haven't you learned that yet?" As if to drive home the point, she downshifted with a lurch as she powered the Impreza around a sharp turn, then accelerated by stomping the accelerator to the floor, causing Forde to be jolted in his seat.

Forde grinned his roguish grin. "Too many lessons to learn. No wonder I'm single after all this time. You must be freezing in that outfit though."

"It's called adrenalin Stan," Seheira replied, with a small but slightly smiling glance Forde's way. " When it wears off I'll tell you if I'm freezing or not. Besides, our mountain-man didn't exactly ask if I wanted to get dressed this morning."

"I'll bet," Forde replied with a half grimace. "His only thoughts are for murderous respect and the hell-begotten art of slicing and dicing. He's probably a member of _Slicers Anonymous_ you know."

A moment of silence ensued, before they both laughed, relieved to have a small moment free of danger and malevolent fury.

"Anyhow," Forde began after a moment. "There's a spare jacket in the back somewhere if you can stand its addition to your wardrobe."

Suddenly, Seheira's smile vanished, and was replaced by her frowning black eyebrows as she peered into the rear-view mirror. "They're back," she warned.

Forde opened the Impreza's glove compartment and removed a box of shotgun shells, and immediately began reloading the Remington to capacity. "Keep it going compadre," he encouraged her. "You drive pretty well for a fitness fanatic! I'll see what I can do about our unwelcome company."

"What about Malcolm?" Seheira questioned. "Shouldn't we tell him what's going on?"

"Radio took a bullet," Forde replied regarding it with remorse. "All we've got is static."

"My mobile is back in the park," groaned Seheira. "Yours?"

"Screen got crushed when I took a dive back there. They don't make 'em like they used to."

"_Damn_," Seheira cursed, thwarted.

"Mal is a cunning old fox, he'll find us, you mark my word. He has an annoying habit of knowing exactly where all his employees are at any given time. I swear he's got old grandma's and the like as paid spies."

Talk died as gunfire raked across the rear of the Impreza once more with angry metallic pocking noises. Seheira swerved in an attempt to avoid the bullets, but the chasing gunman was persistent, and continued to pepper their rear until his clip ran dry. The moment it did so, Forde had his harness off and was leaning out the passenger window with the Remington, and fired three of his twelve-gauge shells at the black Mercedes following mercilessly close behind them. The Remington was loaded with triple-ought shot, which meant the steel balls contained in each shell were larger in diameter, and packed much more destructive force than something like the much smaller birdshot. Forde had confidence he could do some damage.

The Mercedes' windscreen starred badly as several steel balls hit their mark, but Bez, at the wheel of the vehicle, swerved with savagery causing the majority of the shot to miss anything vital. The phantom gunman then appeared from the window on the passenger side with another sinister-looking device, and Stan took a moment to recognise it for what it was. His blood ran cold. It was a German made Panzerfaust 3 rocket launcher.

"Seheira!" He yelled with urgency. "Get us out of here! They've got rockets! Of the anti-tank kind!"

"Crap!" She yelled with frustrated tension. "Can things get any _worse_?"

High chain link fences whipped past in a blur as Seheira sped through an industrial area on the outskirts of Oxford. She knew the area well, having been a resident since childhood, and knew there were no approaching side-roads she could manoeuvre into and avoid the threat sent forth by those behind. So she did the only other thing she could think of.

"Hang on!" she yelled heatedly, before slamming on the brakes.

Forde read her intent with milliseconds to spare, and whipped his head back inside the vehicle so he could grab a hold of his seat's backrest and brace himself for the imminent collision.

The Impreza jolted as if possessed by the seething demons inside Bez' own head, and Seheira fought to control the vehicle as it swerved wildly upon impact with Mercedes behind. Both occupants were whiplashed violently and without mercy, their heads wrenched forward as the Impreza took the solid hit, which caved-in a decent portion of the car's boot space. Her thoughts centred on the single purpose of self-preservation, Seheira immediately stomped the accelerator and the Impreza shot forward with thoroughbred gusto, hoping like the blazes that some good had come out of the move.

Resinous plastic screamed and scraped in mortal pain along with the ruinous noises of stressed metal as the two cars separated. Seheira didn't even _want_ to know how angry she'd made the thugs in the vehicle behind her, more than mildly pissed off, she thought shrewdly. The Mercedes was a solid vehicle, and only the front bumper seemed slightly askew with one headlight broken as Seheira stole a quick glance at it through the rear-vision mirror. She could only hope that a cooling hose or perhaps the radiator had taken a hit, and would eventually cause terminal damage. A thin hope, she thought ruefully.

"That was interesting," Forde quipped as he again poked the Remington out his window. "Did you learn that in anger management classes?"

Seheira pumped the clutch and gearbox with healthy doses of accelerator, commanding the Impreza to a more respectable speed, her honey-blond hair streaming back past the drivers seat amid the in-rushing air. "Oh you know," she replied with slightly upturned lips. "Women drivers aren't _all _meek and submissive. Make us angry and there'll be hell to pay."

Forde glanced back at her briefly with mock horror. "Hell to pay is right!"

The Panzerfaust 3 appeared through the Mercedes' passenger window once more, the pointed tip of its loaded rocket sheening dully in the grey morning light. Spots of rain had begun to fall again as the sky overhead darkened with another payload of bad weather, and Seheira switched on the windscreen wipers to clear her vision. It gave Forde an idea. He took a bead on the Panzerfaust and let the Remington sing once, halting the phantom gunman's dire plans momentarily.

Bez was no fool and immediately resumed his routine of aggressive swerving, his evil dagger stare cutting out through the Mercedes' cracked windscreen with pressurized anger and lethal promise as he worked the steering wheel. Ignoring the murderous killer, Forde simply waited for the swerving vehicle to arrive within the Remington's iron sights, rather than trying to second-guess its erratic movements, and pulled the shotgun's trigger twice with rapid precision as soon as it did so.

The Mercedes' windscreen evaporated into a swarm of angry glass pieces, imploding inward and overwhelming the occupants with a cutting cloud of knife-edged hell. The vehicle swerved wildly, and skidded drunkenly over the loose-gravel shoulder beside the road. The phantom covered his head with one free hand, the other clutching the Panzerfaust in a death-grip to keep hold of it. Bez ruthlessness radiated from him in waves of superheated rage as he fought the wayward and sliding vehicle to bring it back under his control, his eyes now squinted against the peppering rain as it lashed and drove full force through the now vacant and jagged-edged windscreen space. Then one hand left the steering wheel, was gone a moment, and reappeared gripping the phantom's matte-black automatic rifle.

Forde unloaded another vicious hailstorm of triple-ought shot through the Mercedes' open windscreen before whipping back inside the Impreza to take cover. "Incoming!" he shouted tensely, nodding pointedly back at their pursuers. "I think I made them angry!"

"That makes two of us," Seheira replied stoically, but with a resigned grimace.

The dashboard flew to catastrophic smithereens as a fusillade of automatic gunfire battered into it with death-wish fury. Seheira swerved, pumped the accelerator, and hit the gravel shoulder of the road in an attempt to kick up some loose stones and send them flying into the ugly faces of those giving chase. The withering tirade did not let up however, and Seheira's actions only served to make the incoming bullet-storm wander haphazardly across any rear-facing surface the Impreza had. The instrument panel died as it flew apart and became an obliterated jagged wreck, it's analogue dials becoming ominously still, too badly damaged to operate.

Suddenly the assault silenced, either fresh out of bullets, or to ready another diabolical plan.

Forde stole a glance between their seats and out through the Impreza's shattered rear window. The phantom was once again in the process of aiming the Panzerfaust 3 at them, this time through the now non-existent windscreen, grimacing against the cold and driving rain as he did so. Bez, however, was looking back behind the Mercedes, but suddenly whipped back behind the cover of his drivers seat as his own rear window exploded into yet another shower of flying angular shards. Hope lit and fired within Forde's roguish eyes.

Another Foxhound Impreza, with the unmistakable presence of Malcolm Cullen at the wheel, had found them, with what appeared to be Malcolm's world-war-two-era Thompson submachine gun pointed forth from the driver's window, and amid the throes of pounding their assailants with .45 ACP rounds.

"The boss has arrived," Forde informed Seheira as she tentatively straightened in her shredded seat. He grinned at her with encouragement. "I told you he'd find us! The man's a devil at finding wayward employees!"

"Did he bring a freaking tank with him?" Seheira replied, rolling her right shoulder to ease its corded tension.

"Not exactly," Forde replied in bemusement. "But he does have a Tommy gun."

Seheira shot him back a quizzical look, framed amid her long and flying blonde strands. "A what?"

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**T**he 1938 Thompson submachine gun rattled like the devil as it spewed forth a destructive storm of furious bullets, it's one-hundred-round drum magazine remorseless in its capacity for sustained fury. Cullen was bandaged to the hilt, with a wrapping over his forehead, a large patch stuck to his left side beneath his clothing, and another bandage wrapped tightly around his right upper thigh. An ambulance had arrived at the Foxhound HQ in the aftermath of Bez' attack, along with the police and several other Foxhound units. The medics had patched him up, and had him loaded on a stretcher destined for an ambulance trip to hospital. But Cullen was having none of it, and slipped away as the Medics disappeared to focus on Withmore, who still needed hauling out of the HQ at that point.

Cullen had slipped back into the Foxhound building and over to the garage where a number of spare mobile units remained in reserve. Knowing he'd need more serious firepower, he'd delved into his old collection of firearms, amassed over many years working with security forces and meeting other like-minded collectors. The Thompson had been destined to become a non-functional showpiece and hung on a wall somewhere, but somehow, he'd never quite gotten around to seeing the weapon silenced forever.

He could see Stan Forde with a Remington 1100 tactical shotgun, its barrel now protruding from the passenger window of the vehicle they drove, and nodded his approval at Stan's choice of weapon. Not bad in shootout, he thought. From the mass of flailing honey-blonde hair trailing from the drivers seat, he knew it could only be Seheira Sahain in control of the vehicle, and thankfully still alive. Nobody else he knew had hair like that, and certainly not as long and lustrous. Relief flooded him, she had obviously been able to evade the hell-begotten madman, though he was sure there'd be quite a seat-of-the-pants story to tell later. He hoped to God that neither of them had been too badly hurt. If they were, then Hell would be a damn holiday compared to his fury. He already had two good men in hospital, not to mention old Winston, and he'd be damned anyone else was going there on _his_ watch.

Dread dawned as Malcolm caught sight of what looked chillingly like a German made Panzerfaust 3 anti-tank rocket launcher, which, if fired against a Subaru Impreza, he had no doubt would leave nothing but charred scrap metal and splintered smoking debris. He heard the Remington fire twice, then saw Stan duck back through the passenger window, doubtless to reload. The thug with the Panzerfaust hadn't reacted and could only be preparing to fire. Cullen let up on the Thompson's trigger, and slammed the accelerator pedal to the floor. Time was critical.

Like an avenging angel of punishment, Cullen slammed the rear of the black Mercedes with a vengeance-fuelled and grinding crash, violently wrenching it off course and ruining the aim of the rocket man. Bez' rotting face twisted around from the drivers seat to regard him with erupting wrath, then lifted an automatic rifle of some description into view and pulled the trigger. But Cullen knew the nature of the beast, and had heavily suspected it was coming.

Twisting the Impreza's wheel suddenly, Cullen evaded the violent death that Bez sent forth. Again he stomped the accelerator and steered the Impreza on a jolting course up beside the Mercedes, needing to hit the loose gravel road shoulder to reach the position. Stones, grass, and sodden clumps of mud erupted from the madly spinning rear wheels, flying into the air behind him in a great rain of debris. The vehicle's grip on the ground became tentative, but Cullen had not been born yesterday, and kept his line of travel straight enough one-handed to play his next card.

The rocket thug suddenly looked across at him with surprise, clearly not expecting to be staring down the barrel of a Thompson with a vengeance-bent old soldier in control of the trigger. Intent flashed through the thug's eyes, but Cullen mashed the trigger on the faithful old Thompson and it sprang to life, staying true to its stereotypical gangster-associated heritage.

The black doorframe of the Mercedes became Swiss cheese, the Panzerfaust rocket launcher took several solid hits, and the black-dressed thug gyrated uncontrollably with multiple hits as the Thompson sang it's deadly tune. Cullen remained single-minded, the solider of old had returned. Suddenly the thug slumped forward and dumped the Panzerfaust down hard on the bonnet of the Mercedes, causing it to jolt and rattle haphazardly with the movement of the vehicle. Bez' face appeared as the rocket-man fell back, closely followed by his proffered automatic weapon, looking disastrously like an Uzi nine millimetre. Cullen, however, was a step ahead, and had known the play would become dirty. He made his next move. Ruthlessness could only be fought in kind, he knew all too well; it was humanity at its dirtiest, but he also knew that evil only flourished if good people did nothing.

Before Bez pulled the trigger on his Uzi, Cullen whipped the steering wheel aside while still emptying the Thompson's drum cartridge at a furious rate. Both cars collided with a deafening and violent slam, wickedly thrashing both drivers in their seats. Cullen wrenched against his safety harness with lung-emptying force, sending pains shooting through his wounded body as if flaming spears had been thrust through it with heavy force. The Thompson jolted from his grasp and fell across his lap. Cullen kept pressure on the wheel, trying to send the Mercedes into the gutter on the other side of the road. Then the Panzerfaust went off.

Stan and Seheira had opened up a small lead of fifty meters or so since he'd arrived and begun taking up the fight. But with an instant sunk feeling, Cullen knew it wasn't enough. The rocket left the launcher with devastating speed amid a cloud of smoke and spent rocket fuel, its course now set and unchangeable. It sped forward, like a demon on wings of catastrophe, toward the battered rear end of the prey in its sights.

In the last split second, the battered Impreza swerved aside in a futile attempt to avoid the incoming rocket, but it was too little too late. As Cullen grappled in a locked battle with the Mercedes, he witnessed an event that would never leave him for the rest of his life, still waking him in the night years later. The rocket's aim wasn't true, but it hit the asphalt directly beside the rear left hand wheel of the fleeing Foxound Impreza ahead. The result was devastating.

The entire left side of the vehicle lifted skyward as the road became a great gaping crater, the asphalt vaporizing instantly, and the roadbase beneath becoming airborne shrapnel as if a centuries silent volcano had suddenly awoken beneath the road and released a thousand years worth of pent-up pressure. Heat waves thrashed all three vehicles without mercy, almost stripping the paint from their bodywork and flash-melting any material less solid. The boom of the explosion sent vicious pressure waves radiating across the stormy landscape in powerful bouts of destructive force, shattering building windows nearby and stripping the leaves from the trees beside the road. Cullen felt the force thump through his chest like a battering ram, is if trying to wrench his internal organs free of his body. But he had little time to worry for his own safety.

Stan and Seheira's Impreza flew airborne and tipped on its side in a surely-terminal flight of death, and seemed to hang there as Cullen watched with helpless rage and a sudden fear for their wellbeing. It seemed as if every spirit within a hundred miles wailed with indignant injustice as the vehicle slammed sideways to the ground with the screams of rent metal and smoking devastation. Sparks and shattered shrapnel exploded from the skidding side of the vehicle as it self destructed under the cutting strain and grinding slide over the asphalt roadway. Smoke spewed from the vehicle in cancerous bouts of thick and darkened death, heralding a violent end to its indefatigable service thus far. Cullen was horrified, and couldn't believe his eyes, sheer fear for the lives of its occupants wrenching through him like the hand of the Devil squeezing at his heart. A voice then spoke inside him, a voice of warning, and he slammed on the brakes.

The Mercedes shot ahead as the tyres beneath Cullen's Impreza screamed and smoked as they locked intermittently through the action of the vehicles ABS braking system. Suddenly the Mercedes, and the evil face of the murderer within, crashed to sickening stop as the vehicle's front end dropped into the small crater created by the rocket, and stuck fast. Calamitous noise erupted as the body panels of the black vehicle crumpled and bent to jagged shapes as its velocity became zero in a second, and a cloud of dust mushroomed skyward from the impact. Heart beating furiously adrenalised, Cullen managed to caress the Impreza to a wrenching stop beside the hissing and buckled black vehicle and the crater that had bought it down.

Locking another drum cartridge in place on the Thompson, Cullen rushed from his drivers seat and made for Stan and Seheira, their Impreza having come to a halt still on its side and with flames building from inside the engine bay. He made it half way there, before a great ravening beast crash-tackled him to the ground, sending the Thompson cartwheeling through the air and out of reach. Bez.

Rage infused his veins and his adrenal glands worked overtime. Instinct, and years of training as a Special Forces soldier took hold and controlled his actions as if he were on autopilot. Cullen controlled the fall to the ground, and the moment he was down he twisted inside Bez' bear hug and slammed both elbows down between the madman's shoulder blades. Bez screamed and gurgled, and Cullen repeated the blows in quick succession until the crushing grip that held him lost pressure and he was able to wrench free.

No sooner had he stood, than Bez was charging at him again, like a steroid-doped sprinter leaping from the starting blocks. Cullen danced aside, his combat training blazing clearly across his thoughts despite his advancing years.

Bez thundered past like an overweight bull. As he did so, Cullen bought both hands together in a battering-ram fist and again hammered at the shoulder blades of the madman in single mighty blow that would have dropped even the most hard-bitten criminal. Bez stumbled, and dropped down on one knee in a bellowing rage, whipping his head around to curse his assailant with sheeting hate and demonic evil.

Cullen knew he needed to press home his advantage, however slim it might be. He danced in with small boxers steps. Suddenly Bez launched up at him with both fists flying like ten-tonne sledgehammers, intent on delivering a killing blow with the first contact. Cullen ducked beneath the first blow, sidestepped the second, but caught the rapidly following third square in the chest. Enormous pain exploded inside him, but pure reflex formed a right cross that slammed the madman's face with his own pent-up fury and railway-iron-hard resolve.

Incredibly, Bez' eyes lost focus as Cullen's blow rattled through his drug-fried Brain, the old soldier's fury having reached a crescendo of vengeance to form the well-crafted attack. The breath had been blasted from Cullen's lungs however, with the hit that Bez had landed on him with superhuman strength, and he stumbled drunkenly before his legs gave out and he dropped to the ground on his knees. His chest felt as if a massive weight sat upon it, pressing down with such force that every attempted breath resulted in exploding pain.

Although lost within a vortex of agonising pain, Cullen's sharp mind refused to shut down, and he sought out the Thompson with his eyes. It lay on the asphalt some meters to the side of him, but he couldn't command his legs with enough strength to get himself moving toward it. In a fight of brute strength, he knew that Bez would eventually wear him down and tear the life straight from his body with maniacal glee. He had to think smarter than that. He had to fight this madman to _his own_ rules, and not those thrust upon him by the subhuman beast. He looked across at Stan and Seheira's burning Impreza still sitting square on its side, the flames now having engulfed the front portion of the engine bay with thick acrid smoke and searing heat. No movement was evident from the vehicles occupants. He had minutes at best to save them.

Bez bellowed a beastly howl, as if all humanity had suddenly vacated and left only the demon within. Bestial eyes seemed to glow from within and focussed on him with the pure urge to kill. Cullen's strength seemed to ebb with each raking breath of splintered glass and burgeoning agony, yet he returned the stare with a vengeance.

An ungodly battle cry ruptured the small space between them as Bez charged yet again; seeming to have lost no strength despite the calamitous beating he'd received in the last few hours. Cullen's jaw became set, and his eyes hardened. "To hell with you!" he cursed Bez silently to himself.

At the last moment, Bez only grappled with thin air as Cullen wrenched himself aside with such a force of willpower that he seemed to move like a tenth-dan ninja. Cullen's legs still had little strength, so he hit the ground and rolled to where the Thompson submachine gun lay waiting for its owner. He scooped it up, fitted his right hand over the trigger-grip, whipped over onto his back, and pulled the trigger with less than a second to spare.

Thompson's were notorious for jamming, especially with the drum cartridges fitted. But this time Cullen's weapon sang true, dispensing its payload with rattle-gun fury. Bez gyrated and jolted wickedly from each avenging hit no more than two steps away from where Cullen lay on his back. The Thompson's barrel lit and flashed as each bullet flew forth and slammed the evil creature with unforgiving destructive power. Bez' eyes widened, disbelieving, as his superhuman life began to ebb away with each round that fired from the old weapon.

Bez stumbled back under the onslaught, unable to sustain any form of counterattack. Eventually, he slumped to his knees, his eyes glassy and near vacant.

Cullen silenced his faithful collector's item, its final shots throwing clearly defined echoes between the walls of the industrial buildings nearby, but eventually fading into the distant horizon.

"I – _own_ you," Bez croaked haltingly in a final display of deluded madness, his eyes seeming to focus one last time. They were the last words he ever spoke.

"Not _today_ you don't," Cullen vehemently threw back at him. He aimed the Thompson at the madman's hellish head, breathed a silent prayer, and pulled the trigger for three seconds.

Bez lifeless and nightmarish body slumped without ceremony to the asphalt, defeated.

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**C**ullen stood unsteadily, and took three steps toward the burning Impreza with Stanley Forde and Seheira Sahain still inside, the Thompson still gripped within his right hand and his ears ringing from the bedlam it had dispensed. Still not a whisper of movement was evident in or around the vehicle and Cullen began to fear the worst. He'd taken a beating this day, and had to concentrate against a developing headache that threatened to split his head apart like a jackhammer, but he dare not allow himself a moments rest. Not yet.

Suddenly, two men in black were dousing the flames with fire extinguishers, and pointing Uzi's toward him with bedrock expressions of military starkness and authority. Cullen froze, not knowing from where the men had come, who the hell they were, or what the hell they wanted. Both sported bulging muscles, flat topped and close cropped black hair, and equally black military-style fatigues. They might have been twins, except one was a clear foot taller than the other.

The flames mercifully died under sustained attack from the fire extinguishers.

"Who the hell are you guys?" Cullen heatedly shot at them both.

Uzi fire erupted in reply, the bullets hitting the asphalt around his feet and ricocheting off in haphazard directions.

"Shut up!" came a short and brusque reply from the shorter man. "Move, talk, or pass wind, and you will die."

Cullen could do nothing but comply with the order. He was in no physical shape for another fight, and the bland expressions both men carried left him with no doubt they were professionals, able to kill without worry or remorse. Shorty came and stood before him, pointing his Uzi toward his chest with an unshakeable hand.

"The Thompson," he said with cool indifference. "Hand it to me now, slowly. Test me and you will be shot." The man spoke with a slight Spanish accent; otherwise he had no other distinguishing features. No bent nose, no facial scar, no crooked teeth; the man was as plain as they came, except for his muscular bulk.

Cullen knew with his soldier's sense that he could not tango with these men by himself; he'd last seconds at best. It was another fight for another time. The main thing now was that he attempt to live, and take up the fight another day when he had a better chance of evening the score. If the men wanted Stan and Seheira dead then surely they would have simply let the Impreza burn with them both inside it, and maybe riddle it with Uzi fire for good measure. Even now the taller of the two seemed to be unbuckling them from their harnesses through the shattered windscreen of the vehicle and was taking care not to injure them further. It was a kidnapping. Taken alive for ransom or some other type of leverage, Cullen had no shadow of a doubt. At least they would be kept alive, Cullen thought, if only for a small amount of time. There might be a small chance for them to escape or be rescued. He could only hope.

Slowly Cullen raised the Thompson, offering Shorty the butt end of the weapon with slow and fluid movement. Shorty took it without a word, and then turned to help his comrade with the two limp figures he was manhandling from the upturned Impreza. Only a glacier-cool flick of his eyes told Cullen not to do, or try _anything._

Seheira was laid out on the road not far from where Cullen stood. Her eyes fluttered as if to open and her chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm as she drew breath. She was alive. She had cuts and bruises but otherwise seemed unhurt. Cullen surmised she must have taken a bash to the head at some point that had knocked her unconscious, and was only now just starting to regain cognisance. The taller man put a small needle in her arm at the shoulder, checked her pulse, and gave her no further thought, except he draped a spare Foxhound jacket over her brief singlet top, no doubt to keep her warm. An odd thing to do for a hostage, Cullen thought, and he could only guess that she was indeed wanted alive, and as unhurt as possible. Otherwise why go to all the trouble? However, Cullen knew that the likelihood of her later torture was extremely high, her screams added to whatever demands her kidnappers had in mind to make. The thought made him seethe with unjust anger.

Stan received similar treatment. He had a nasty gash across his forehead, and his left forearm seemed to be bleeding from a seemingly clean-cut slice just below the elbow. Added to that, Cullen knew he'd been hit up fairly nastily the day before during the car chase that had put old Winston in hospital, the injuries he'd sustained then being no small matter either. Typically though, Cullen thought with slightly upturned lips, it took more than a few clean bullet wounds to slow the man down. Again, he could only hope the hostage-takers would patch him up half decently to keep the wounds from turning septic, and find some value in keeping him alive.

Both hostages were now dead to the world and limp as the taller man carried each to yet another waiting black Mercedes Benz E Class and bundled them inside, the needle shots they had each received ensuring they stayed compliant. After both Stan and Seheira had been secured, the tall military man whistled in a signal he was ready to make tracks. Shorty however, was not quite done.

Stalking past Cullen with a stony expression and authoritative steps, he walked to no more than ten meters away from Cullen's Impreza and let loose with his Uzi, the Thompson lazily resting over his left shoulder as he did so. Glass and tyres exploded amid a calamitous racket as the bullet hailstorm withered the vehicle to diseased Swiss cheese in mere moments. Only after it appeared truly forlorn and damaged beyond action, did Shorty let up on the trigger.

And then they were gone. Cullen watched as the tail lights disappeared into the horizon and winked out. He cursed silently, the bitter taste of defeat leaving a hollow pit in his stomach. Vengeance, he swore then and there, would be his, and curse the man who might get in his way.

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**M**inutes passed, the grey stormy morning again conspiring to sour Cullen's mood with a soft blanketing rain that fell amid distant muted thunder. He ached like damnation, and knew he would pay for this morning's torture with weeks of stiff and painful recovery. Compared to his sense of loss however, the physical aches and pains he might feel were but miniature gnats and a mere annoyance. He stood; arms folded in the rain's soft embrace, eyes splitting the horizon, and allowed himself a single despondent moment to mourn the dire straits of two very good people. All vehicles around him were wrecks, and Cullen knew he could offer no pursuit. There truly _was_ nothing he could do.

Seemingly out of the rain-misted ether, a sleek metallic-blue Jaguar XJ X351 rolled smoothly to a burbling stop amid the wreckage, its supercharged engine being the only give-away that it had arrived. Cullen turned to regard the vehicle, but could not see through the darkly tinted windows to identify who was at the wheel. The rain beaded and ran over every square inch of the highly polished paintwork, and Cullen might have assumed the vehicle belonged to a wealthy Oxford business identity, or a prominent lecturer at the university, except he'd seen it before. Intrigued at the vehicle's timely appearance, he waited with arms still folded as the driver's window descended noiselessly.

The newly arrived stranger was soon revealed to be a man with wavy black hair and chiselled facial features, with an age of no more than thirty at most. Tanned skin revealed he was no office worker, and his bluemetal eyes hinted at a vast well of intelligence as they regarded Cullen with an appraising focus. He was dressed simply in a grey woollen turtle neck sweater and black slacks, with no distinguishing marks to reveal exactly who he was. No malice was apparent, and the man even seemed somewhat concerned for Cullen's predicament as they sized each other up.

"I take it you could use a ride Malcolm Cullen?" the man then asked in a strong voice, yet holding an understated affable nature. "They have a few minutes lead on us, but I happen to know they'll be heading straight for a private airfield not far from here." He then inclined his head toward the passenger side and said, "Get in."

Cullen's head filled with unanswered questions, but he knew that now wasn't the time to press them upon the stranger. He nodded once and moved around to the passenger's door, opened it, and slid into the black leather seat beside the newcomer. What the man's purpose was, Cullen had no idea, but the similar intent to catch up with the kidnappers was enough for him to risk trusting the stranger, at least for the next half hour. After that, all bets were off.

As soon as Cullen had closed his door, the stranger bolted from the mark and accelerated the Jaguar to speed with butter smoothness. "Name's David," he offered, with a hard-edged, yet friendly glance toward Cullen. "You look like hell," he said then, after the greeting.

"I'll bet," said Cullen in agreeance. "It's not every day an inhuman beast mistakes me for a punching bag."

"They're what we call Super Soldiers Mr Cullen. Humans, who've been enhanced with drugs, surgical bone-strengthening implants, and artificial muscle building methods until they're highly-developed fighting machines. You were lucky to survive the encounter. Did it have a name?"

"Used the name 'Bez'," Cullen recalled. "But also mentioned the name 'William'."

David nodded, eyes never leaving the road. "His name was Charles Bezelman. He disappeared from a Spanish jail more than ten years ago. The escape always puzzled the authorities, as the method he used to get out was complex and would have required intelligence and many months in the planning. Charles was _not_ an intelligent man. In fact he was well known for his lack of it."

"Someone busted him out then," Cullen suggested, still deciding how far to trust the man.

"Right," David affirmed. "The 'William' that Bezelman mentioned is almost certainly a man by the name of William Cortez, who we now know to be responsible for his disappearance. We also know that Bezelman was an early attempt by Cortez to create his super soldiers. Since Bezelman's development, Cortez has perfected his methodology far beyond what you saw this morning. Had you tested the two men who took your security officer and Ms Sahain, you would have certainly died very quickly."

Cullen didn't need to be told the fact, but mused the point over a moment nonetheless. "Who is 'we'?" he eventually asked.

"I cannot tell you Mr Cullen. All I can tell you is that for the time being, I work for the British government. Although anyone you ask about my existence will flatly deny that I, and the department I work for exist." He looked over at Cullen with a knowing glance. "Right now you're wondering if you can trust me. I know _I_ would be if I'd been through what you have in the past few hours. All I ask is that you give me a chance to show that I'm on your side." A short silence ensued, as if David pondered his next words. "But don't get in my way," he continued then. "Things have already progressed far more quickly than we had anticipated, and I cannot allow you to slow me down."

Cullen knew there was no malice in the warning, his military mind recognising a man with a mission and the single-minded drive to see it completed, but took note of the no-holds-barred tone in David's voice all the same. "If your intent is to see Stan Forde and Ms Sahain safely home then you will find no argument from me," Cullen said. Then he squarely fixed David with a look of hard-bitten granite. "But if you intend them any harm whatsoever, then I can offer you no such promise."

David nodded once again and briefly locked eyes with the hardy ex-soldier. "Then we have an accord Mr Cullen," he replied. "Lara Croft will need their support for what's coming, and for that to happen they must stay alive." David then shook his head ruefully as he returned his eyes to the road. "Cortez is far more organised with this operation than we knew," he revealed then. "The first I knew you were under attack was when one of our operatives reported explosions inside your headquarters a few hours ago. I've known Cortez a long time, but I just _didn't_ see this coming. Not so soon after the first attack at Lara's mansion at least."

"Who _is_ this William Cortez?" Cullen then pressed him. "And what the hell does he want?"

"Exactly what he wants we still don't know," David said with creeping frustration. "All I can tell you is that Lara Croft knows something, or is on to _something_ that Cortez wants. She had something secreted in her mansion that he wanted badly, and he broke in and wrecked the place to get it. And now that he _does_ have it, he's clearly stepped things up a notch."

"Any idea what was taken?"

"None. Only Winston knows what Cortez' henchmen took, and they came extremely close to killing him for that knowledge alone. He's sedated under heavy guard at the hospital though, in the same room as your other officer, and until the doctors there say its safe to wake him we're flying blind."

"Winston is a tough old boot," Cullen assured. "He'll pull through."

"I hope you're right Cullen. For everybody's sake, I hope you're right."

The Jaguar knifed through the falling rain, as a samurai blade might part silk, and throttled along the narrow Oxford hinterland road with speed-driven purpose. Soon, they turned onto the Northern Bypass road and began weaving through the early morning traffic like a formula-one racecar moving up through a field of learners. David was silent, and constantly checked a GPS screen that displayed their position, along with satellite imagery of the surrounding countryside. A small side road appeared on their right in the distance, and David tapped the GPS display as if affirming a thought in his head. They peeled off the Northern Bypass and thundered along a smaller country road for some minutes, before David skidded the lithe vehicle onto a little-used gravel country road. Thankfully, the flinted stone roadbase had not softened in the wet weather. Before long, they arrived at a large, wide-open area surrounded on all sides by tall trees. What they saw sitting in the middle of the huge clearing, beggared belief, and both men sat floored as they took in the sight.

Powering up at the beginning of a lengthy asphalt runway was a massive aircraft straight from the wartime history books. A jet-black B-17 Flying Fortress had all four 1200 horsepower Wright Cyclone turbo-supercharged engines whipping at the at air mercilessly with their three-bladed Hamilton Standard propellers, measuring in at a diameter of eleven feet seven inches apiece. The noise was nothing short of catastrophic, the reverberations setting up vibrations all throughout the Jaguar's interior, and also causing a distinct vibration within each mans chest cavity. Both stared dumfounded at the massive thirty-one meter wingspan, and at each of the thirteen Browning M-2.50 Calibre machinegun emplacements situated over the aircraft.

"Jesus Chri –," Cullen started, but was cut off as the tail gunner's position came alive with flashes of fury.

David caught the threat the moment the initial burst of gunfire became evident, and he slammed the accelerator down hard as a line of exploding earth raked toward them with fatal speed. At that moment, the massive aircraft began rolling across the tarmac, it's nose aimed toward the empty runway and the freedom of the clouded sky ahead.

Lightening stabbed across the haunting scene as the Jaguar leapt forward, throwing the countryside and dragon-like aircraft into stark relief. Thunder boomed as yet more of the machinegun emplacements opened up and harried the slippery prey with a deadly hailstorm of evil death. David swerved and spun the wheel in evasive manoeuvres, and the Jaguar bit into the gravel beside the runway and gained thoroughbred speed under the power of its supercharged V8 engine. The tirade was hellish, and several bullet lines were unavoidable as yet others tore at the ground all about them, before punching through the Jaguar's bodywork with ruinous ease in lines of spewing destruction.

None of the B-17's occupants were visible, however the black Mercedes sat abandoned beside the runway, close to where the aircraft had originally been. Only having been minutes behind the kidnappers, Cullen surmised with yet further frustration that their adversaries had obviously been in contact with each other, and that the aircraft's crew must have gotten her ready for takeoff before their counterparts arrived. They had simply then loaded the hostages on board, and pushed the throttles to their stops for takeoff.

David cursed, knowing that he and Malcolm were severely outgunned. He aimed the Jaguar for the rear of the aircraft, and once more stomped the accelerator into the carpeted footwell. They could do no more against such firepower, except flee and save their own lives. Several more hits starred the rear window and punched through the boot as they sped away from the aircraft and back toward the entry road from which they had entered. Before they reached it however, David threw the vehicle into a one-eighty degree turn and controlled it to a stop with a deft touch of driving mastery.

Both men were silent as they stared at the retreating form of the B-17 as it thundered down the runway with increasing speed, its black and shining airframe clearly evident through the still-falling rain and the occasional bathing-white flashes of lightening. Wind-driven spray could be seen sheeting off the wings as it went, whipped and slashed by the great propellers as they strained to claw the formidable aircraft up to speed. Helplessness was an inevitable feeling, felt by them both as the 22.6-meter aircraft slowly lifted into the air and gained altitude in the sombrely grey storm-riddled morning. Once it had gained enough height, it angled over in a sweeping turn that offered a view of its entirely black wingspan, and appeared like an angular burnt beast of hell. Soon, it became one with the horizon, and appeared to meld with a line of hills that were misted amongst the clouds and gently pattering rain.

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**C**lean up crews laboured to clear the mess the storm had left behind later that morning. The sun shone amid parting white clouds and news soon spread around the town that the Foxhound Security building had been hit by lightning several times, causing an internal fire and damage to the premises. People shook their heads as they read the midmorning news. Apparently, several Foxhound cars had also been put out of action as tree branches had fallen and damaged them during the maelstrom, the drivers taken to hospital with moderate injuries. A load of pyrotechnics had also spilled onto the road in an industrial area, one larger firework even going off and damaging the road with a small crater. No one, it was reported, was hurt in the incident. Although an early morning jogger had seen several damaged cars being towed from the area, no doubt damaged from a building collapse or some such like.

Cappuccinos were sipped with yet more shaken heads, as one report detailed how a woman's house had been broken into early that morning. It was surmised that the thief had hoped the cover of the storm would hide his actions, but it appeared the woman had beaten him off with a heavy frying pan from her collection in the kitchen. The unnamed woman had now gone to London to stay with family while she recovered from the ordeal, and the thief was now in Police custody.

Farmers had seen a massive black aircraft winging its way over their green fields as they ate their morning breakfast. Curious enthusiasts had called the Aviation Authority to ask if there was an airshow someplace that they didn't know about. The curiously out of place Flying Fortress had stopped over near Oxford, they were told, on its way elsewhere as part of some wealthy adventurer's newest scheme. All papers checked out for the wartime showpiece, but its final destination wasn't known.

The cover-up had been orchestrated, the far-reaching portents of the actual events deemed unnecessary for public ears. Two men, however, knew the truth. And when they had their vengeance, Hell really _would_ seem like a holiday for those responsible.


	8. Prey Hunter Part I

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**I'm back, I'm bad, _and_, I'm freaking Raiding Mad!**

**But I guess you all knew that already.**

**So its been a while since Lara showed up in this clandestine mix of intrigue and shadowy centuries-old plots that probably seems like a tangled spaghetti mess right about now. Admit it! You've all been waiting for Lara to get back into this story! Am I right? Well am I? It seems like freaking 50 years since I last wrote a chapter with her in it, which is kinda weird, if you stop and think. Because this is meant to be a Tomb Raider story. Begone side characters! I hear you cry! Get lost prologue! No Lara? Are you mad! Are you bereft of all sanity? In short, yes. But again, you all knew that already.**

**I admit I dallied with this one. Generally messed around, took breaks, and began writing about Lara's great great great (continue as necessary) granddaughter waaaaaaay into the future. I'll leave it to others to touch upon Lara's more intimate relations, because yeah, some are required for the great great great (continue as necessary) granddaughter to exist. Don't get it into your heads that this chapter is finished! Forget it! I hit 6000 words and realised that if I wanted people to read it, I might have to make it more manageable. So here's part one for your enjoyment. At least, I hope you enjoy it. Please don't throttle the person next to you in disgust, or heaven forbid, someone in your family if you don't like it. Send me a virtual throttling and I promise I'll do the strangling for you. You know I'm good for it.**

**Yeah I took my time with this. I really needed the break. But then, you know, all this cool stuff popped into my inexplicable head and I found myself back at the keyboard.**

**See that! ^^^^^ I'm ranting like a madman. Maybe I should let you get reading.**

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***6***

**PREY HUNTER**

Part One

**Somewhere Beneath the Bolivian Rainforest  
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**T**ezra Tekkara limped with stabs of electric pain. Blood, warm and slick, dripped to the ancient pathway at his feet and mingled with the broken stonework, forever lost to him as it soaked between the cracked and ages-weary pavement. He grimaced as weight once again came upon his skewered and burning leg, he'd been careless, and it rankled like chains that twisted around his hard fought pride. His ancestors had built the trapped passages deep within this place long ago, and he felt a strong and passionate connection with them. Yet it hadn't been enough to keep him from falling victim to their clandestine and masterfully engineered security systems, put in place to protect this hidden world.

Resigned to his injury, he knelt amid alien foliage, taking care to choose an area in deep shadow. A poisoned dart had hammered into his lower left leg, but luckily it had passed through his calf muscle cleanly, leaving no trace of the strange volcanic glass the spikes had been fashioned from. The poison each carried, however, was a far different proposition. He delicately unwrapped the hastily concocted bandage he'd managed to fabricate in the confined dark tunnels, and inspected the wound.

Without knowing how the poison had been made, Tezra had had no other option but to try a general antidote of Thonapa's making, and pray to the Gods it would have some effect. His head felt slightly dizzy and his thoughts hazed, but he was still alive, albeit somewhat worse for wear. The old man, he thought slyly, must not have slipped into total senility just yet, despite his extreme age. Tezra's leg still hurt like the blazes, a red trickle continuing to ooze from it, and he knew a replacement bandage would be required to help staunch the flow.

Teeth gritted against the white-hot, raw nerve-endings in the wound, he tore an arm-length sleeve off a cotton shirt in his backpack. So much for his spare clothes, he muttered, as the sleeve parted company with a distinct ripping sound. Three tenderly wound wraps later, and Tezra had his replacement field dressing in place, fastening down the loose end with a safety pin from his medical kit. He knew though, from hard-bitten experience, the wound would need better attention within the next short while, or else infection could begin to gain a stranglehold over him. But that would have to wait. He had a strong feeling the British woman was close by, and he couldn't allow one such as her to gain _any_ sort of advantage over him.

With as much stealth as he could garner, Tezra made slow progress along a broken path that led through a mystifying underground forest, the likes of which he'd never before seen in his entire life. It filled almost every available space in the cavern with a lush mix of the most inconceivable plants any human could ever concoct inside a dream. Huge broadleaf fronds towered above him as if massive dinner plates had shot forth from a water fountain, and were now frozen in time midair. Ramrod straight tree trunks rose into the gloom sprouting masses of delicate ferns, and over-sized spider-orchids grew beside the path in large clumps. Tezra could only gaze in wonder at how such a place could possibly have come to be.

Strewn through the forest haphazardly, were outcrops of black volcanic rock that featured large-leaved palms of varying sizes sprouting up from every available crevice they could find. Veins of an astounding blue mineral also wove their way through the otherwise unremarkable dark stone, seeming like subtle lightening bolts against a pitch-dark sky. Tezra found the place almost maddening, odd formations glowed with eerie blue light all throughout the massive chamber. Even high up on the cavern roof, lost amid the darkness, he could see pinpoints of light, as if he viewed a cloudless night sky.

Dominating everything however, was a truly massive, near perfect crystal that descended nearly halfway down to cavern floor, and seemed to provide the light the one-of-a-kind forest required to thrive, bathing most of the cavern in its soft unearthly blue glow.

Pushing a sizeable old-man leaf aside, nearly his equal in size, he knew his gushing wonderment would have to wait. The enigma-woman was extremely dangerous, her successful traversal of the trapped passages being yet another piece of irrefutable evidence of her deadly skill. The very fact she had found this place at all told him she was no mere adventurer running on blind luck. Some kind of intelligent instinct seemed to be at play, ingrained within her, guiding her movements. Again he wondered, the cogs in his mind turning for the umpteenth time. Who was she? What did she want? Would she be difficult to silence? Would he have to kill her?

Silently treading across a shallow pool in the muted light, surrounded by short broadleaf grasses, his eyes caught a more regular structure off through the criss-crossed tangle of competing underworld plants. There could be no mistaking the straight lines built into a solid stone wall, nor the also-maddeningly gothic spires that rose into the air above it. Tezra's eyes narrowed, as he wracked his knowledge for answers to explain the out-of-place designs. Once more he asked himself, exactly _what_ were European designs doing in a cavern beneath the forest, in the Anchotuma valley, in _Bolivia?_ Once more he came up empty.

Stepping across further shallow pools, and a gently running stream that trickled over the path from between two massive palm trunks, Tezra soon discovered that the 'forest' had grown all the way up to the base of the wall. He threaded through the last of the otherworldly thickets, and found himself standing before two moss-covered square stone pillars, centered by a pointed archway that rose to no more than a meter above his head. Looking up, he noted the square pillars extended above the wall to mix with the moist cavern air, finishing in pointed spires that also appeared covered in a green moss or lichen of some type. Not the work of his people, he pondered thoughtfully. Stilling his breath to listen, he then quietly pulled a well-used Colt .45 pistol from a holster belted to his hip. Black to reduce telltale reflections, the weapon had served him well for many years, and he'd maintained it with rigorous care to make sure it fired when he meant business.

Quietly passing through the pointed archway, Tezra entered a sizable rectangular courtyard intermingled with low and tumbling stone walls, as well as several old and gnarled trees that fought to gain purchase between the ancient stones paving the ground. Everything appeared old, ancient even, and it was plainly evident to him that nobody had visited the place in an exceptionally long time. Raising the Colt, he began a methodical search of the courtyard, stepping over moss where he could to silence his footfalls, and moving slowly only after his eyes had adjusted to each patch of gloom. She was here; he could feel it.

First, he checked the maze of low, mainly waist-high walls that spread in a square latticework over a portion of the courtyard. Each one presented a decent hiding place, but somehow he wasn't surprised to find them uninhabited. He found nothing of note, save for some oddly carved stones within the walls, a few crumbling manmade pools, and an assortment of other decaying stone structures of no apparent purpose. The woman was nowhere to be seen.

Looking around, he then eyed several pointed arch doors in the outer courtyard wall, and moved toward the nearest one for a closer inspection; maybe the mysterious woman had gone through one, he reasoned, and was hiding on the other side.

Arriving at the door he noted it was made from solid stone, fretting with moist decay in places, and had not moved in centuries. Leaf litter, as well as years worth of accumulated grime, had lodged against it, the sure telltale signs of inactivity. There was nothing to see here, and so he moved on. The next door along the wall netted a similar examination; nothing presented itself, or piqued his intuitive interest.

He moved on again, looking for any signs of recent activity, until he finally came upon a doorway built differently from the others. Clearly it had some significance, it was larger, and the bas-relief scrollwork snakes had returned, having been carved into the stone door itself. Also, immediately above the point of the arch sat a small stone carving of a hideous gargoyle face, or some other underworld beast, teeth bared in a maliciously evil grin. Though he knew it was stone, Tezra could have sworn the demon watched his every move through its lichen-encrusted eyes, smiling with delight at his trepidation.

Dismissing the feeling of eyes at his back as childish, he studied the doorway as he'd done with the others, immediately noting another gargoyle head sitting beside it atop a waist-high pedestal of timeworn stone. This demon head was carved from a far smoother material than the one above the door, but also had its long razor-like fangs bared in a snarl of silent defiance. Tezra moved closer to study the beast head, noting it was about the size of a basketball, and had an unblemished covering of dust over every surface. It had not been touched in a long time. It stared back at him through gemstone eyes that seemed to harbour the faintest red glow, no doubt catching the dim ambient light that surrounded it, focussing it to a visible point. Again he pondered the fact it had not been touched in what appeared to be centuries; the woman had either missed its presence, or dismissed its importance altogether.

Certain it was the key to opening the door, a sense of profound discovery welled up inside him, and he inexorably found his hand reaching toward the demon figure to discover its secret.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

The voice seemed to seep from the stone walls, or the smiling demon itself. For a moment he couldn't tell which, and thought he was slipping into insanity. Harried intuition caught up with events, and Tezra spun around to face what he thought could only be the guardian spirits protecting their domain. The colt whipped up to ward off the ghostly threat, but he became frozen solid by intense malachite-green eyes that bored into his brain like a diamond-tipped drill. Two silver guns glinted in the light, unwavering in their intent to serve their mistress, and Tezra swore he could see down inside each barrel to the bullet within.

"Who are you?" He ground out through gritted teeth. He raised his voice in defiance. "Who are you?" he bellowed a second time, the Colt shaking in his grasp.

The voice spoke again. "I'm the lady of the forest," it said in a fine British accent. The eyes flicked aside to indicate the direction from which he had recently come, "I hope you left me a tribute at the shrine you sat on back there." The voice came cool, calm, and unruffled.

"Wh – what? Forgive me, I didn't mean to – ". He stopped, his poison-dulled thoughts shifting up a gear to grasp at reality more firmly. He suddenly realized that his mind had wandered, and that he was more under the influence of the poison than he'd first thought. The effect had crept up on him so subtly that he'd never even seen it coming, and he knew he now had to fight to keep his thoughts real; a hindrance he could do without just at the moment. "Shouldn't you have fairy wings then?" he asked after a short reorganising pause. "And a basket of forest fruits for the poor and needy?"

With feet firmly planted, the woman bounced from side to side, as if limbering up for a hundred-metre dash. The gleaming pistols didn't move a millimetre. She smirked, as if she knew something he didn't.

"Sorry," she replied with a half sultry, half knife edge lilt. "We modern fairies do things differently now-a-days. Fairy wings are so last years fashion, don't you know." Her voice then went ice-cold, and her eyes even more businesslike as she said, "Drop the gun. This little fairy wants to know why you've been following her all day."

Tezra knew there was no doubting the woman's steely resolve, and inwardly berated himself for being so careless in allowing her to creep up and pop out of the ether without warning. He simply couldn't let her get the better of him; the stakes were way too high. "Can't do it," he said evenly so as not to provoke her. "You have no idea," he added carefully," about what this place is, who built it or why. You should not be here, and I cannot let you stay. I'll die to that end if necessary."

The cutting green blades of her crystalline stare never wavered at the threat, yet a look of intrigue drifted over her fine facial features. "You'll find," she admonished, "that very few people tell me what to do. Least of all someone with a gun pointed in my direction." Her right pistol jutted forward, the left remaining not far behind. "Tell me why you think you have the right to kick me out?" She asked, stilling her smooth limbering movements.

"I don't have to tell you anything," Tezra replied curtly. "Just leave."

"If I refuse?"

"You're not stupid, you won't refuse."

"My brains got me here, I think you'll find. They won't make me exit so easily."

Tezra shook his head slightly to show his disappointment. "Then you're not as smart as I first thought."

"You're the one who nearly set off the most obvious trap in the house," the woman replied. Her eyes flicked to indicate the demon head by the door behind him, followed by a quick jerk of her head toward it.

"The demon head opens the door," Tezra replied, recalling what had occurred moments before. "Any fool can see that. Do you really think you can cloud my mind with your self-righteous drivel?"

She shook her head, causing her long braid to sway with the motion. "No," she replied. "The fool _is_ the person who thinks the demon head opens the door. Consider how obvious the demon head is, how it's been placed, and the expressions on both the one above the door and the one on the pedestal. Consider the minds of the people who made the traps in the tunnel we both came through. They didn't want _anyone _coming here, except those who could pass their tests without being killed. Do _you_ really think their tests are finished with, now that we've arrived here?"

Tezra felt indignant at her suggestion of his ignorance. "Considering that they are _my_ ancestors, and considering that this," he motioned outward with his free hand, "is my homeland, I think _I'm_ better qualified to judge what they were thinking at the time they built this place, _and_ how they did it."

"Then why don't you give the demon head a pull?"

"Because you'll put a bullet in my brain the second I turn away from you."

The woman's expression became thoughtful, and she nodded in agreeance. " I can see why you'd be thinking that, and I can't fault your logic, but I've never shot _anyone_ in the back. _Never. _And _you_ won't be the first, I can promise you that."

Tezra laughed a wary laugh. "Sorry lady, but it will take more than your word before I start believing a _thing_ you say." He studied her more closely as he spoke. Her toned midriff, sheening with sweat, her athletic arms, her combat-style boots, her contour-hugging top, and her purpose-built utility belt with its array of attached gadgets, all served to fuel the mystique that seemed to surround her. She was a tough customer; of that he was sure. Her feminine intrigue, with deeply coloured eyes and long lustering hair, all seemed at odds with her guns, grappling hook, and tactical military-style backpack. She was an inexplicable mix of beautiful woman, rugged adventurer, and steel-edged fighter. She was intelligent, she was dangerous, and, she set him on edge. "The only way out of this," he then continued measuredly, "is for you to leave, or for the both of us to get a bullet. You choose."

The woman regarded him with her strangely unsettling gaze. "There is a third option," she said, her expression hardening. "But I'm not quite sure you'll be over the moon about it."

"Enough!" Tezra commanded, with only a hint of apprehension. "I do not get told what to do either! Especially in my own lands, and certainly not by fashion models in tactical gear! Go! Leave this place! And never come back!" He jabbed the Colt toward her to press home the command, his finger pressurizing the trigger.

The woman's eyes went wide, but they weren't focussed on him. Instead they looked over his head, at something behind him. "It – it can't be," she breathed. "Im – Impossible!" Her eyes tracked – something, and her head shook in denial. Fear washed over her in a dark cloud of confusion, causing her to take an involuntary step backward.

Tezra could not help but steal a quick glance over his shoulder, to get some sense of what had put the otherwise concrete-resolved woman off guard. The moment he did so however, he knew he'd been had, because there was nothing but air and centuries old stonework behind him to meet his scrutiny. He cursed his own stupidity, knowing he'd fallen victim to nothing more than clever play-acting.

Ruthlessly refocussing on the woman, he found her mid backflip, having used the split seconds he'd looked away to full advantage. The Colt sang in his hands, but he'd forgotten to alter its aim amid the confusion, and the shots went high, sailing over her flexed torso as she bent through the air.

Additional shots from the woman's pistols answered in reply, the bullets whizzing past his eardrums and fluttering his shoulder length hair. Tezra's self preservation instincts took over, and he dropped to the ground prone to avoid any further shots she might unleash. His Colt sang again as his chest roughly pounded down onto the stone pavers, but the jolt to his body threw his aim askew once again, his shots going wide this time. She moved too damn fast, he thought frustratedly, as he helplessly saw her roll across the ground and reach cover behind one of the low walls in the courtyard.

She was going to be harder to silence than he thought.

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**T**he wall felt gritty at her back as she exited her sideways roll and pressed up against the ancient fretting stonework, pistols gripped in both hands, and her legs coiled and instantly ready to unload her once again in any direction she so might choose. As she squatted, supported by the wall, listening for the slightest pin drop, Lara felt certain there was more at play here than had so far been discussed. She couldn't begin to theorize what the additional details were, but one thing was for sure, the man trying to put a bullet in her was no hired thug, or possessive treasure hunter. There was far more to it than that. Lara heard hurried shuffles as the man picked himself up to continue the fight.

The entry to a small rectangular area with a central shallow pool was no more than ten paces away, and she'd covered three-quarters of that distance before her attacker had the faintest inkling she was on the move again. Mid flight, she heard him curse softly to himself, and then step quickly to catch her up.

Lara hit the crumbling entryway at a full run, took three measured steps, and then vaulted over the rectangular pool with the easy fluid grace on an expert long jump athlete. Her boots hit the opposite edge with a solid thunk as a bullet fizzed by, striking the wall opposite in a shower of chipped stone and a puff of centuries old dust.

She barely slowed as she reached the opposite entrance, now no more than the decayed remains of a once-grand stone archway. Her mind hit overdrive, and she holstered her right hand gun with the speed of oiled lightning, before reaching out to grab hold of the doorway's edge so she could swing around it in a ninety-degree turn. Another crack rang out behind her, but she had now entered a thin passageway of sorts, and the walls were head high to cover her. The pistol in her left hand was transferred to her right in less than a second and she repeated the turning move to the left this time, through another doorway on that side, and rushed headlong into a dilapidated room.

The 'room' was another rectangular space with similar dimensions to the first, though the opposite wall had suffered badly over time, and now stood no more than waist high with loose stones strewn about it. Lara took a forward dive across the stone-littered cobbles, rolling to a stop so she faced the doorway through which she'd just come, and framed by the opposite doorway so she had escape options. Again she crouched coiled like a catapult, both gleaming pistols pointed at the doorway and her fingers tight on the triggers.

Lara's eyes bored into the part-shadows like X-ray spotlights, the blue crystal-light gloom being enough to distinguish larger details, but leaving the small and minute a mystery to all but the acutely aware. Though largely forlorn, the ruins displayed an uncanny likeness to classic Roman lines and build philosophies. The square pools, the largely decayed statues, and, beyond the wall to her left, the distinctive remains of a hypocaust under-floor heating system. Images of the place in its heyday flashed through her mind as she tried to decipher the purpose of the ruins. People had lived here, a fair number judging by the sheer dimensions of the complex, but exactly why they chose to live in this place, and how they came to know such building techniques, remained a mystery.

Suddenly a subtle shadow darkened the doorway just a little more than the ambient gloom had already done so. Lara's hands and arms became one with her pistols, and her she-wolf vision lowered a touch to better align with the sights atop them.

A fold of clothing appeared.

_Blam!_ She fired a touch early, shredding the fold to threads, and sending Heckler & Koch echoes reverberating throughout the ruins.

_Blam! Blam! Blam!_ She unleashed a further three rounds, each pistol firing in smooth concert with the other, creating a smoky dust-haze in the passageway along with a veritable shower of chipped stone. Death was not what she sought. That was reserved for murderers, pillagers, and people who oozed evil as if the shades of night escaped their pores like a liquid poison. Such people existed, she knew all too well; she'd met them before. This man was none of those however, in fact, Lara had the very distinct feeling he was the exact opposite, making her less than eager to shoot him. Just why he wanted to shoot _her_ however was a mystery that she'd yet to decipher, difficult seeing as he appeared bent on it. But the answer surely played a part in the greater puzzle that had led her to this very place.

The Colt appeared from around the corner.

_Blam!_ Lara blasted a single shot, and it retreated as if suddenly stung by viperous mosquitoes.

_Blam!_ A second shot warned the man not to try the move again.

Lara allowed a few moments for the echoes of her gunshots to dissipate. Then she had a suggestion to make.

"Maybe you'd prefer talking instead of shooting? It's just a suggestion, but I'd prefer to do this _without_ getting shot." Her tone left no question however, that extra bullets would be forthcoming if the answer was 'no'.

"Are you mad?" a frustrated voice called from the shadowed passageway beyond the door. "You're _trespassing_ here! You don't _belong_ here! I don't care _what_ gibberish you've got to say! _Leave!_ Or else!"

"Trespassing?" Lara queried. "Then tell me why the security code to my satellite phone got me in the front door."

"Lies!" The man called back with a half-bitter laugh. "I know your type! You try deception, _trickery_, or murder; _anything_ to get your hands on lost treasures or hidden wealth! I've seen it before!" His voice began resonating with deep suspicion. "You lust for treasure without thought for what it might mean, or who might still claim it! Take your greed and leave this place for its rightful people!"

_He so doesn't know my type_, Lara thought. But she asked, "Don't you want to know _how_ I found this place?" She hoped to bait him with the question.

"Blind luck," the voice accused. "Or did you kill somebody for a map that led you here?"

Lara's voice remained businesslike, with a trace of warning. "_Luck_ and _murder_ have _nothing_ to do with it," she stated. "If you took more than _half a minute_ to judge me, I think you'd find that murder makes me sick! And do you _really_ think I just _blindly_ wandered through the forest and happened to fall into an underground river?"

There was no reply for few moments, which was a good sign. He was thinking about it.

"Did you study that stone keypad back at the façade at all?" She pressed. "Did you notice its modern layout? How about the _Globalstar_ arrangement of the buttons? _Tell me how that's possible!_" Then she moved in for the hammer blow. "If you must know, I found the 'map' to this location in the palace of King Midas."

Silence lasted a few moments before a reply came.

"Nice try. King Midas is a fairytale; I don't believe you." But the voice held less conviction than it had before.

"And until today, _this_ place may as well have been a fairy tale also, because you never knew it existed. _Did you?_"

False unsure bravado began to permeate her pursuer's words. "That – all of that – means nothing! Whatever it is you think you know, be sure that you know nothing of this place, or the struggles of the people who built it. This is _my_ world, and I want you to leave it!"

"Sorry," Lara replied almost pleasantly. "In ways you won't understand, this is my world also, and I won't be cut off at the pass just because someone asks me to leave. Maybe _I_ don't trust _you_ either."

Lara felt sure now that the man hiding behind the wall was no mere treasure hunter or hired assassin. His manner and conviction told her otherwise. Facts and details _did _seem to matter to him, whereas a simple treasure hunter or thug wouldn't have cared less about such things. He was no murderer either; all he wanted was for her to leave without a fuss, and leave him here to ponder the place on his own. She suspected that, given his earlier comments, he'd come up against thugs before, black market treasure hunters perhaps, and was now highly suspicious of _her_ because of it. He'd have to get over it however, she thought, because she had no intention of going anywhere. She offered him a final ultimatum.

"My terms are we sit down and talk this out, _without_ bullets. It seems to me that both of us aren't what we first appear to be to each other. Behind me is a large courtyard with a flat-topped stone in the middle, looks like an old table if I had to be pressed. I'm going to go and sit on it, with my pistols in their holsters. You come out when I'm settled. I'll give you the word."

"What if I don't want to play ball?" His voice was suspicious.

"You should know that I sleep with my pistols."

A short pondering pause before, "Very well, we'll try it your way. But I should warn you I'm a touchy man. I hate sudden moves."

"There see?" Lara replied. "We have something in common already. I hate sudden moves also! See you in a bit."

In less than two minutes, Lara had seated herself on the stone block. Her long braid hung down in front of her right shoulder and her hands were clasped in her lap, her pistols safely secured at her sides. She took a moment to steady swirling thoughts, and to take several deep breaths. Adrenalin began to pump.

"Come join the party," she announced.

The Colt appeared from the gloom first, slowly followed by two outstretched arms, and a chiselled face that dripped in scepticism. He could have been handsome in another time and place, in a tuxedo perhaps, with a martini in one hand and the keys to a fast car in the other. As it was, it appeared he hadn't shaved in days, and the beginnings of a light beard were in evidence. Added to that, his limping leg had a blood stained bandage wrapped around it, and his eyes were red; doubtless something to do with the poisoned dart that had injured him and the antidote he must have used to stay alive. Lara fixed him with a level stare as he approached.

The pistol did not disappear like she'd hoped as the as-yet-nameless man cautiously approached; he appeared to be picking out every detail she possessed, and then banking the information away in a mental database. His gun hand was not solid; it shook slightly, either from apprehension or the mind-numbing effects of the poison that must surely still be affecting him. Lara appeared serene and relaxed as she sat upon the stone 'table', but inwardly her muscles tensed, and her adrenalin pumped. Martial arts trained, Lara knew full well how to explode into action within the blink of an eyelid if the situation called for it. Her almost-luminescent malachite eyes bored into his as she allowed him to approach, proffering the Colt toward her as if warding off an evil spirit. He came close, a mistake, and his face hardened with resolve.

"You were a fool to think that I deal with thieves," he said with conviction. "I'm afraid your stupidity has bought you undone. You will leave, now, or I will shoot. Don't think to test me. Like I said, I've dealt with people like you before. Now _move!_"

A moment passed, Lara did not move. She'd held out the olive branch, and had it thrown in her face. So be it, she thought, _his_ loss. And she idly wondered just how many others there _were_ like her, not many most likely. He'd made the mistake of binning her in with thugs and hopeless blundering fools; his lesson would need to come the hard way.

"Think carefully," she levelled at him. "I said the negotiations would _not_ involve guns."

"_I SAID MOVE!" _he commanded again.

Lara moved. The smallest breath of time was all it took for her to sweep his gun hand aside with a pulverising blow that sent the Colt spinning off across the courtyard. Before it had clattered to the pavement, Lara was standing, had gripped his outstretched arm in a vicelike grip, and delivered a crunching knee-blow to his mid section, driving the wind from his lungs and doubling him over in furious pain.

His eyes went wide as he clutched for her in retaliation, but she was no longer there. Lara had danced aside and delivered another punishing shove-kick to his backside, sending him sprawling and crashing down face first into the pavement. Seconds had passed, and he now lay stunned and on the verge of passing out.

Lara knew he'd had enough, she was no barroom brawler, and she had no intention of hurting this man any more than was necessary. She smoothly walked to where the Colt had come to rest, picked it up, removed the half-spent magazine, and then walked over to set both items down on the stone table. She sat down next to them, in the exact position she'd been in before, and waited.

Slowly her pursuer rose, deeply inhaling, and wincing from the after effects Lara's body blow had delivered. Suddenly he seemed to come aware, and he quickly looked around for his assailant, surprise clearly evident once he found her sitting as if she'd never moved. He looked around again, searching for his Colt.

"I said the negotiations would _not_ involve guns," Lara repeated, her tone leaving no room for argument. "Do you feel like talking now?"

He glared at her, raising up an accusing finger. "What are you? Some kind of demon?"

Lara then smiled, attempting to quell his anger. "Do you see horns on my head? I'm just a girl, quite human I assure you." She then made a face of hurt feelings. "Do you really think I look like a Demon?"

He took three steps toward her, rage building, and then stopped abruptly as if he'd come into contact with a clandestine force field of some sort. "Don't play games with me!" he accused her. "You're military!" His pointing finger shot forward. "From some sort of goon squad or something! The way you move! It isn't natural!"

Lara's face moved to perplexed. "Military? A moment ago I was a fashion model. What would a fashion model be doing in the military?"

"Stop twisting my words!" he blustered. "You are _dangerous!_ People like you should be –"

A noise cut him off mid-accusation; a trilling sound that came from his pants pocket. He stared down at it, thinking he'd truly gone mad this time.

"Your phone's ringing," Lara said pleasantly, though also somewhat truly perplexed at how it could be so, underground as they were. "It could be your mother," she added. "You'd better answer it."

Glaring at her once more, the man dug his own _globalstar _satellite phone from his pocket and stared at it suspiciously a moment, clearly with the same thoughts about it as Lara, and then bipped the answer button.

"Hello?"

"Thonapa? How on Earth are you –"

"Of course I'm alive! What's going o – "

He quickly looked up at Lara. "I'm dealing her now!"

"A few cuts and bruises! Nothing I can't handle!" He looked away again, as if to talk in private.

"What do you mean she's too dangerous for me to –"

"I think you're overstating matters!"

His face visibly paled as he shot Lara another glance. She waved at him in a petite, girly fashion. He looked away again, thoroughly confused.

"Are you serious? Are you sure it's the same person? She looks like –"

"Yes she's got long hair," he said with another quick glance.

"Two pistols yes but –" He frowned.

"We found a cavern, with something inside, a fortress of some sort. I don't need her anymo - "

"So what? I followed her in. No she didn't get a scratch, but I don't -"

"Her name's Lara Cro –?" He stole yet another glance toward her. He shook his head. "Are you sure?"

A pause before, "Well – she took my pistol. She says she wants to talk."

"What do you mean _dead?_" He was indignant.

A longer pause occurred, before he looked up at her with newfound respect. Then he said, "Damn it to hell! I find this out _after_ I tried to shoot her? "

Some further nods occurred, and a few short replies, then, worry began to descend over him once again, and he stilled to make sure he was hearing correctly. Finally, the phone came away from his ear, and he spoke with a mix of resignation and urgency.

"It's for you," was all he said, before tossing her the phone.

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	9. Prey Hunter Part II

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**Hail readers! I can't begin to imagine what, the heck, you're doing here! Shouldn't you be taking out the trash? Finishing that assignment? Putting the finishing touches on your thesis? Yeah! Right! And I should be busily trying to become an insanely rich oil tycoon who, just for laughs, bathes in a swimming pool filled with hundred dollar bills!**

**So you came wanting to know what the frack (spot the battlestar Galactica tragic) is going on with Lara and the assassin who isn't an assassin. Is your story actually going anywhere, you ask? *Maniacal Laugh* Oh yes! Just you wait! You'll see! [Mainiacal] Heee Hee Hee [/Maniacal]. **

**Yeah! Another month passed before I got this posted! Truth is, I was, and still aren't, entirely happy with it. A few ideas are still left hanging, but, they'll be tidied up as the chapter goes further. A few character lines are still a little too much out of character etc etc and so the list goes on.**

**Now! Do I have to twist arms to get some more reviews! I _love_ twisting arms so look the heck out! *Glare* :)**

**Right. I'm shutting up. So you can get reading!**

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***6***

**PREY HUNTER**

Part Two**  
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**L**ara plucked the phone from the air with panther-quick reflexes. Her gaze ponderous, and locked on the man standing before her, she casually put the small device to her ear. If he intended to joke her around, there'd be sure hell to pay. A small part of her mind registered the weight of her ever-present pistols in their holsters, reaffirming they were close at hand, and available should a thin ruse begin to materialise.

"Hello?" she almost demanded, as if conducting a tiresome business deal.

To Lara's half surprise, an old voice answered, with an almost unsettling wisdom. "The one and only Ms Croft I presume?" it queried.

"If there's another one," Lara replied, "I need her restrained before she signs too many cheques in my name."

The voice chuckled. "If there _was_ another like you, Ms Croft, I think I'd have come across her by now. Since I haven't, and neither has anybody else, then I assume you are the genuine article. Besides," it said in a grandfatherly fashion, "your voice is a direct match, making you _unquestionably_ the genuine article."

Lara's interest piqued. "Voice recognition? My _my,_ you must _really_ have a bone to pick with me. Did I take something that belongs to you?"

"Not at all Ms Croft I –"

"Call me Lara."

"As you wish," the voice replied with forbearance. "My name is Thonapa, it's a pleasure to finally speak with you."

"Charmed, I'm sure," Lara said, with a hint of playfully false favour.

"Now," the aged man then began. "I don't have long. I needed to reroute one of my satellites to get a signal into that cavern where you both are, and its orbit isn't exactly fantastic, but the best I could manage at such short notice. I've got maybe 10 minutes before the ground-penetrating laser I'm using will degrade too much for us to speak. Added to that, the Americans will not be happy if I crash-tackle one of their GPS satellites, which I now happen to be on a direct collision course with. But, enough of that, let us get to business. I am not your enemy, and neither is Tezra Tekkara, the man who's done remarkably well to keep up with you by all accounts. There _is_ another though, who wants you, your friends, and also _anyone_ remotely associated with _me_, dead. I _implore_ you, _please_, to listen to me a moment."

Immediately suspicious, Lara considered the likelihood of a clever bluff being in play, but noted the bone-weary worry written all over Tezra's face as he began to pace back and forth, with an occasional searching look back at her. He didn't appear to be play-acting. Added to that, the old man on the phone almost seemed to be begging her; a desperate plea intermixed through his polite words. "As it happens," she replied thoughtfully after a moment, "my diary is free for the next ten minutes."

"Good!" Thonapa replied with thinly veiled relief. "Do you know a man by the name of William Cortez?"

"Cortez?" Lara replied. "No. Should I?"

"There's no reason you would Ms – Lara. But he knows about _you_, and he knows where you and Tezra are right now. If you trust in one single thing I say, trust me when I say that William Cortez is an evil man like no other on this planet. If he, or one of his slughead henchmen finds you, they _will _try to kill you, by _any_ means necessary."

"I didn't tell _anyone_ where I was going," Lara replied with some scepticism. "Not with enough detail for someone to track me so easily. How could anyone know where the blazes I am?"

The old man didn't miss a beat. "Cortez spotted your helicopter with high resolution satellite imagery. But somehow he got tipped off before that on where to look." There was a slight pause before, "Did you know your mansion got broken into two days ago?"

Lara bristled. She stood, her features becoming stony anger. "_What?_" But then she took a pensive pause. "Why should I believe you?"

"I can't prove it to you over the phone Lara, I'm sorry." The old man seemed genuinely distressed. "The thieves likely stole something, or found something, that has allowed them to pick up your trail."

"And _you_ know this _how_ exactly?"

"I've been watching Cortez a long time; a very long time. Six hours ago I picked up a supersonic aircraft headed from Northern Spain, where William Cortez resides, on a direct intercept course to where you are in Bolivia." He sighed, knowing Lara was having difficulty believing his story. "Look – you don't sway easily Lara, I can tell that, but just stay with me a moment."

There was no bluster in his voice, nor was there evidence of intelligent coercion at play. _Something_ told Lara to listen, and heckled, wary pinpricks began to dance over her body. Her 'bump of trouble' as it were, that had served her so well in the past, and was usually right on the money, was beginning to stir uncannily. Tezra, despite Lara's upraised pistol, only looked at her in askance as he paced back and forth a small distance away, hobbling slightly on his injured leg. No plotting thoughts seemed to consume him, just a growing manifestation of worry that seemed to grow with each passing minute. His true agenda, however, along with that of the man on the satellite phone, remained as yet unrevealed.

"I'm listening Mr Thonapa," Lara said after her thoughts had solidified. "But the second I smell a rat, you and your accomplice will find yourselves on my less-than-friendly list. And I do my utmost to give _those_ people – _troubled dreams_ shall we say." She paused a moment to make the warning clear. Then she said, "Now, what's this about my house being broken into?"

"Pro job," Thonapa replied without preamble. "They knew what they were looking for, and made a mess of your mansion to get it. I don't know a lot more; Foxhound's mainframe security systems are a damn nuisance, making hacking difficult, but I did find out your butler is in hospital, along with another Foxhound Security man."

Lara nearly choked. "Winston? Hospital? What hap – is he – " The question died on her lips.

Static began to entwine its way through the reply. "I'm sorry Lara, I don't know, I was thrown out of the Foxhound systems before I could find out more, except that a red Aston Martin DB6 was turned to wreckage in the process."

"Mmmm," Lara replied deep in thought. "It'll have had the keys in the ignition. Winston must have used it to try and get away, he always did have an affinity for it."

"The same thought had crossed my mind also." Thonapa agreed. Then he implored her, "Lara, you've got trouble approaching. Deadly trouble."

"The supersonic jet you mentioned?"

"Yes."

"This 'Cortez' you mentioned?"

"Or some of his drug-enhanced thugs." Again a wash of static threatened to drown Thonapa's words. "Tezra can tell you more, but don't trifle with them, they _will_ kill you, and they won't think twice about it."

"I'm losing you," Lara warned, and she tried re-orienting the Globalstar's antenna to better catch the fading signal.

"Damn!" Thonapa cursed with deep-rooted frustration. "My calculations were slightly out it seems, I'm getting too old for this seat-of-the-pants stuff. I'll have to move the satellite; else there'll be a large junkyard orbiting the Earth pretty soon. _Quickly_, listen to me!

"If I'm right, what you've found there is the mountain hide-away a desperate group of Inca scholars hid within during the Spanish conquest in 1535" – more static, in a sustained burst this time – "I know that _you_ were _supposed_ to find that place! I have centuries-old stone carvings that tell me so!"

"_What?_" Lara almost blurted. She spoke quickly, knowing time was short. "This gets better and better! If I didn't think you were crazy before, I can tell you you're on shaky ground right now! What you're saying is impossible!"

"Not impossible!" The old man was adamant. "Come on Lara! _You_, of all people, know just how complicated this world is! Things that shouldn't exist, _you've seen_, with your own eyes! _You know_ there are secrets mankind at large has yet to discover!"

"Think about what you're saying!" Lara shot back at him, her pistol wavering as she made the point. "How could anyone living centuries ago know about _me_, about the future? A bit fanciful don't you think?"

Thonapa didn't miss a heartbeat. "No Lara, I do not," he replied with imploring conviction. He sighed then with further frustration. "Look, we're out of time. If I'm right, you should find a series of square stone bas-relief tablets, hidden somewhere in the ruins of that cavern. They won't be easy to reach, because the men who put them there _knew_ who would be coming to find them. My guess is they will have some meaning to _you, _and no one else. Find them, and you'll see I'm not creating some story to blind you from any other real truth!"

Static overtook the connection, obliterating any further attempt both participants might have to speak. Lara listened as a savage burst rose to a crescendo, then suddenly quieted. A faint voice was still there.

"…. _Please… talk…Tezra! …..no lie!…"_

Then the phone went silent.

Slowly, with perplexing thoughts, and mammoth ramifications crisscrossing her mind, Lara pulled the satellite phone away from her ear. It was true, she _had_ seen things, _been_ places, that mankind was simply not ready to know about, not yet. But exactly how the old man on the phone had known this, certainly meant there was more to him, and Tezra for that matter, than even _she_ had begun to suspect. Looking into the future was impossible. Wasn't it? Lara considered herself open-minded about a great many things, but this – just seemed too fantastical to consider. Was she really supposed to believe that Inca scholars living in the fifteen hundreds had discovered a way to see into the future? There _had_ to be another explanation, she thought. There _must_ be!

Lara tossed the satellite phone back to its owner. "Your friend has quite a story to tell," she levelled at him, her expression pure business. Then, reaching an internal decision, she lowered her Heckler & Koch, and slid it home into its waiting holster. Although bizarre, Lara had to admit the story had piqued her interest. It was at least worth playing along for a little while, until the proverbial fruity rat began to materialise.

Tezra caught the airborne phone and folded away its chunky antenna with an audible click. "He's my father actually," he explained, as he retuned the phone to a large pocket in his pants. "And yes, it's quite a story. But every word is true let me assure you." He then looked at her directly; plainly relieved to see the Heckler & Koch had been put aside, and said, "We need your help Lara." The request was plainly spoken, yet filled with feeling, and heartfelt plea. "Thonapa told you about the stone tablets he believes are here?"

Lara nodded. "Yes, he mentioned them."

"If we don't find them first, William Cortez will blow this place apart to get his stinking hands on them. He's already on his way here, or one of his murdering thugs at least. The man does whatever is necessary to get what he wants. If it means blowing away half a mountainside to get at something within, he'll do it. If you and I get killed in the crossfire, we'll make his goddamn day!" The last words were spat with contempt.

"And if I find these tablets for you? What then? Bye bye Lara and thanks for all the fish?"

"No," Tezra replied. His words took on a deadly seriousness. "You are somehow a key part of what was foretold in the stone tablets we have uncovered to date. You appear several times" – Lara opened her mouth to protest – "I know you don't believe a word of that, God knows, I wouldn't either, but if you saw the carvings – well, it's you, there's no question about that now. Our best guess is that you," he pointed at her, "are the only one who can follow the trail of the disappeared Inca scholars, and _not_ get killed."

Lara's intrigue was building, leaving the taste of mystery at large on her tongue. "Why would these 'scholars' have gone to so much trouble to keep themselves hidden, apart from simply not wanting to be enslaved by the Spanish?"

Tezra shook his head and threw up his hands in empty postulation. "We don't know, not with any certainty anyhow. All we know for sure, is that the scholars who escaped from Cuzco felt _absolutely_ _certain,_ that something they had would be nothing short of catastrophic in the hands of the Spanish. They felt it so strongly in fact, that they went to incredible lengths to keep – something, out of the hands of the Conquistadors."

"The ability to see into the future?" Lara offered.

"Most certainly," Tezra replied. "But there's more to it than that, _much_ more. We need to find out what it is before William Cortez gets his hands on something he shouldn't."

"And your part in it all?" Lara queried, head cocked to the side. She continued to fix him with her X-ray stare. "Why does all this mean so much to you?"

"Because Thonapa and I are part of a very small group of people remaining today, directly descended from those who hid in the mountains here after the Spanish invasion in 1535. Ever since that time, our people have worked to keep the final journey the scholars took back then a secret. However, the Cortez family, descendants of Cortez the Conquistador, have also worked unrelentingly to _uncover _the secret. Over the years, the Cortez family have whittled us back through murder and evil in its most pure form. There's now too few of us left to keep them at bay any longer. Added to that, Thonapa is the only remaining scholar, who keeps a small portion of our knowledge alive. All others are dead."

Tezra began to pace again as he spoke, using hand gestures with each point made. He described the escape undertaken from Cuzco by the scholars, their battle on the banks of a mighty river, and the loss of one of the boats. "Those who knew of the technology stowed aboard the remaining boats," he continued, "no longer exist. Nothing was recorded, to keep the knowledge away from those who shouldn't know it. If some record _does_ exist, of the objects spirited away on the boats, we've yet to find it."

Lara was becoming more deeply intrigued by the minute. A battle begun almost five hundred years ago was still being played out to this very day, _if_ Tezra was indeed telling the truth. Whether or not she was supposed, or preordained, to discover the location the mysterious Inca scholars had fled to, it sounded like the sort of knife-edge adventure she lived for. It was this type of interplay between mystery and discovery she breathed for. The thought made her smile devilishly. She could do with a little more excitement in her life just now, she thought wolfishly, and with savouring anticipation. The danger sounded real, _very real_, but the more there was, the more she liked it.

"And there I was, thinking there couldn't be anything else _this_ interesting left on Earth to discover," Lara mused half to herself, but loud enough for Tezra to overhear. She flexed her neck muscles, then and gave her own summary. "So it's get the living daylights out of here with these supposed stone tablets before Mr evil incarnate arrives?"

"For the moment, that's about the strength of it," Tezra replied.

"How long before they get here?"

"Maybe two hours. But god knows where they'll land a supersonic jet."

"If they're as clever as you say, they'll find somewhere."

"You can bet on it," Tezra said with a shudder.

Lara tossed him the Colt, followed by the clip she'd removed from it. She'd already gotten it off him once, and was sure she could do it again if required. _Keep your enemies close_, she thought, the well-known wisdom of great leaders past echoing through her mind as she formed her own plan. "To business then," she said outwardly and pleasantly. "Lets get down to sorting this mess out shall we?"

Tezra gave her a mock salute with the Colt he'd just caught. "You're the boss Lady Croft! So shall I give the demon head a pull?"

"No," Lara said, somewhat distracted, as she turned to wander into the ruins once again, her mind already shifting focus to the secret she knew they contained. "You'll kill yourself if you touch it."

"So what's _your_ great piece of wisdom then?" he challenged her.

Lara turned to look back over her shoulder, gave him a conspirational look, added a hint of playfulness, and said, "Follow me and find out."

Lara led the way amongst the maze of ruined walls and dust covered, boulder-strewn passageways that had not been traversed in centuries. Questions remained, reeling off in her mind one after the other as she thought through everything that had happened so far. Did Tezra _really_ not know what 'technology' the Inca scholars had escaped with on the boats? Surely he and Thonapa must have _some_ idea, she thought, or else why would they be so intent on sleuthing the mystery first? Thonapa had control of his own satellites? Truly? If so then he was a man with immense resources, who could be dangerous if he turned out to be her true enemy. She'd been broken into? A story perhaps? Concocted to ensure her cooperation? Lara allowed cool focus to enmesh with her crystalline mind, and, she promised herself that _nobody_ would be taking her for a fool. One chance she'd give Tezra and Thonapa, and one chance only.

She jogged, her mind mapping out a mental route to an area she had scouted earlier, where she knew that all was not as it seemed. A head-high statue sat forlorn in the middle of a square courtyard, an almost completely erased face staring outward from a cracked and timeworn figure, richly dressed in flowing robes, and with long cascading hair. Had the woman ever been flesh and blood, Lara thought, she would have been beautiful indeed. Although worse for wear, she knew the unknown woman had kept a secret for a very long time.

She circled around the statue, her right hand held out, palms open, as if to establish some kind of empathic link with the regal figure. She'd lost an arm at some point, the remains of which lay scattered at her feet, but even so, it didn't seem to change the aura that the statue imparted across Lara's appreciative eye.

"Can't you leave your art appreciation until later?" Tezra huffed as he arrived limpily into the presence of the two women. He tapped his watch and caught Lara's eye, "clocks ticking."

Lara's face briefly flashed with annoyance, but the expression quickly became foxy. "Oh ye of little faith," she said simply.

Lara reached out and gripped the statue with both hands, where the frozen woman held some sort of large terracotta vase under her remaining arm. Lara braced her athletic legs, and pushed for all she was worth, hardening her refined muscles into visible relief.

Tezra was about to continue his impatient verbal assault, but was halted mid thought. Why he hadn't noticed it before he could not fathom, because it hit him now like a bulldozer on steroids, a glaring truth that slapped him a full body blow. Lara, held an undeniably exquisite, and beautiful allure, and again he found her a complete paradox; she was an attractive woman, with granitic strength of character, physical strength, and yet intermingled with a graceful feminine aura not unlike that of the statue she wrestled with. He shook his head slowly, massaging his temples as he did so, now seeing her for the striking woman she was. He'd simply been too intent on her more dangerous qualities to notice it before.

"Exactly what is it you hope to achieve?" he asked her eventually, making sure not to betray any confused thoughts with his words. But the moment the question was finished, the statue moved.

Slowly at first, but then a little faster, the statue began a grinding turn on the spot as Lara pitted the full strength of both her legs against it. She breathed deeply as she flexed her will upon the statue, and her inquisitive, malachite-green eyes focussed with renewed intensity upon a point somewhere beyond the immediate ruined walls around them, as if to study the place from afar and theorize a plan. Surprised by the statue's movement, Tezra thought to jump in and help her, and moved to do so, but quickly realised it was a one-person job only, no other opportunity existing to grip the statue in a fashion similar to the way Lara had done. He stood thwarted, and all he could say was, "I'll be damned!"

Lara rotated the regal-looking woman somewhere shy of one hundred and eighty degrees, only finishing the traversal when a definite, ceramic-sounding thunk came from somewhere within the statue. She stood and arched her back, then used her right forearm to hook her left arm across her chest at the elbow, stretching all muscles associated with it. Repeating the stretch for her right arm, she studied her handiwork, then looked slyly across at Tezra.

"You were saying?" she asked him, her slightly upturned lips taking any sting from the question.

Tezra sighed a defeated sigh. "_Ok,_" he said with a theatrical bow. "You win. The statue moves. So now what? We've given the woman with the vase something else to look at, and no doubt she'll be grateful for the _next_ thousand years – until she gets tired of the scenery over _there_ instead?" Tezra nodded in the direction the statue now faced, while he cradled his arms and held his chin pensively.

Lara became the feline fox once more, her eyes ablaze with anticipation. "Are you always so cynical?" she queried. Then she stepped around the statue and pointed to the ground. "Look. See here? What do you see?"

Tezra also stepped around to the front of the statue, opposite Lara, and stared down at the stone pavement. After a moment, his eyes widened. "I'll be damned," he said again, with a new sense of discovery. He bent down, and gently brushed away the loose stones and additional grit covering the otherwise smooth stone pavement. Then he looked back up at her. "There's a line carved into the stones," he breathed, bathed in discovery. "So subtle, how did you ever see it?"

Lara rested a hand on the smooth skin of her midriff, at her side, and pointed toward the line with the other. "It isn't half obvious," she said, somewhat perplexed as she regarded him. "It sticks out like many things proverbial! It's so unnatural within this setting that you almost trip over it!"

Tezra looked back down at the carved line doubtfully, and said, "You do?"

"Can't you see the way the folds in the woman's dress form a pointer right here?" Lara asked, and bent down to touch a finger to the spot. "Dress material doesn't do that, it doesn't fall that way," she explained. "Not now" – she looked up and regarded the woman's nearly smooth face once again – "and not back in _her_ era either. So something's up."

Tezra continued to look doubtful. "So – it's a case of connect the dress to the carved line on the floor? I don't see how that's supposed to be glaringly obvious!"

But Lara's attention had already refocussed, and she now looked away, again seeming to see something beyond the stone walls surrounding them.

"You'll get the hang of it," she said dismissively. "We're not done quite yet though," she added. "Come on."

Again Lara led the way through the crumbled remains of the ruins, again consulting the mental image she had drawn up within her minds eye, and again moving through the terrain with a jogging mix of dance-like steps and small leaps where knee-high boulders blocked her path. She saw a puzzle emerging, and it's solution seemed so simple, yet, clever, and she found herself admiring it's faintly hinted presence. Before long, she arrived at what had once been a small room, perhaps a storage closet of some type, or a larder. Immediately she was suspicious, and carefully scanned the scattered remains within the space, along with the portions of floor and wall she could see. Suddenly, her eyes caught a small corner of something on a portion of wall, something that she had almost known would be there, and she squatted down to move the fallen stone blocks away from in front of it.

"Now what?" Tezra asked, more respectfully, as he limped up behind her.

"Something clever," Lara replied, thoughtfully. "Something _very_ clever."

"Lara," Tezra began in askance. "It's – a wall."

Lara stood, and, brushing sticking dust from her knees, gave him a wiser-than-thou look. "It's more than that Tezra. Look carefully, one of the stone blocks has a carved surface."

Tezra peered. "What?" Then he looked back at her with a pure question mark. "I'll be damned," he said, again stuck for anything else to say. "How did you – " But he remembered her earlier reply. "You can't tell me that _that_," he pointed to it with a quick jab, "sticks out like _anything_ proverbial!"

Lara's foxy expression was back. "It does to me, mystery man."

Tezra shook his head in resignation. "And you think _I'm_ the mysterious one," he muttered. He swept his hand around in an encompassing gesture. "Finding anything amongst this – rubble, is like finding a needle in a haystack!"

Again, the edges of Lara's lips curled up, as her green eyes seemed to fluoresce. "Ahhh – _maybe_ Mr Pessimistic. But as long as you know where to _find_ the needle, then what's the problem?"

"Has anyone ever told you you're crazy?" Tezra accused with a waggling finger.

Lara waved him off, as if the revelation were nothing. "Oh yes," she said with drawn out theatrics. "I get _that_ all the time!" With that, she gave the carved block in the wall a hefty kick with her right combat boot.

Both peered with expectation down at the innocent looking block, seemingly cemented in place and not looking at all like it was anything more than it appeared to be. But then it moved, a ceramic twang immediately causing a small dust cloud as it shifted inward suddenly, before it continued still further into the wall with a smoother grinding noise. Another stone-like click then sounded, as if locking tumblers had been moved deep within the wall. Lara crossed her arms across her chest, and absently played with her lustering braid, her mind forever sifting, plotting her next move. Tezra, to his own unending annoyance, stood dumbstruck.

"I'll be damned!" he said yet again.

Lara uncovered no less than three additional carved stones, covertly hidden in odd locations around the ruins. Two other worse-for-wear statues, one of a stately scholar, the other a warrior holding a spear upraised, also completed the mysterious mix of mechanisms that were clearly part of some overall grand scheme. Lara was in her element, and found the mystery invigorating, even though she heavily suspected what the final outcome would be. Tezra continued along in her wake in silence, helping to rotate the scholar, and also to remove a few larger stone blocks where necessary. He simply had no idea how on God's Earth Lara knew what she was doing. The clues she followed, appeared to him to be so subtle, that they may as well not have existed at all.

The muscled soldier statue, to Lara's reckoning, was the last piece in the puzzle, but it moved only begrudgingly, mired by centuries of immobility. Again Tezra could not help but admire Lara's physique as she pitted her feminine will against the statue, her leg, stomach, and shoulder muscles seeming to morph into clearly defined lines with the effort. To say she was muscular would be going too far, he thought, but she certainly _was_ tough, in her own feminine way. Slowly but surely, Lara took the fighting man though a two hundred and seventy degree turn, or thereabouts.

The now familiar thunk of hidden stone tumblers again sounded out from somewhere within the statue, and Lara halted her exertions with a pent up breath of released effort. She stood, and again went through a series of stretches to relieve her hard-worked muscles.

"You're doing the next one," she said, looking across to Tezra. "This guy _really_ didn't want to move."

"I live to serve Ms Croft," he said with another mock salute. "Are we finished our statue turning and block pushing labours yet?" he asked. "I really don't see any pattern to all this. Is it really necess –"

A loud thud suddenly cut him off and echoed through the cavern, its origin undeterminable as the noise bounced from every surface conceivable. The echoes began to die, but were replaced by thunks and shudders as unseen mechanics worked beneath their feet. Tezra looked across at Lara with alarm.

"What the?" he almost accused, as reverberations began to climb up his legs.

Lara wore a satisfied smile, and began walking toward the outer wall of the complex, closest to where they now were. "Come and see something extremely clever," she said, with a half look sideways. Her demeanour was calm, even amongst this inexplicable din, as if she had fully expected what was now happening.

They threaded through the ruins separating them from the outer wall, which only took a minute. There, Lara found a sizable stone block, fallen from a ruined wall nearby in years past, and sat on it facing the outer fortress wall. She folded her arms, and waited. Perplexed, yet again, Tezra sat beside her.

The thuds continued to sound all around them, but appeared to be moving in origin, as the clandestine grand finale played out. There was no doorway built into the fortress wall directly in front of them, which confused Tezra even more, but Lara stared at it with supreme confidence. Suddenly, the wall began to heave, as if a destructive tremor coursed its way through, causing fretting stone to fall noisily to the floor, and any dust not laden with subterranean moisture to billow out in thin clouds.

"Gods above!" Tezra whispered tensely. "What have we done?"

The noises reached a crescendo, now centered somewhere deep within the fortress wall, a grinding mix of indescribable parts that worked toward a mysterious accomplishment. Just when it seemed the activity would go on forever, eerily, it went deathly silent.

"You'll get a kick out of this bit," Lara prophesised as she peered forward with intense interest. A brief moment hung after the words had left Lara's lips, the air heavy with expectation.

Suddenly, catastrophically, the wall before them exploded outward. Large stone blocks erupted forth amid outrushing dust, some spinning madly, others simply tumbling forward, and coming to rest haphazardly on the ground before them. Some smashed into smaller pieces, others cracked the pavement with their sheer weighty force. The noise was near deafening, and both Lara and Tezra needed to block their ears with firmly placed hands to keep their eardrums free from assault. A badly shattered boulder skittered to a lively stop no more than a meter from their feet; it's cracked and newly exposed surfaces speaking volumes of the immense forces at play. Tezra jumped involuntarily, and half stood, peering into the dust cloud in case any more pieces should shoot forth. Lara grinned devilishly.

As quickly as the chaos had begun, it quieted, leaving only the two humans to contemplate their handiwork though the airborne dust. They waited, for some minutes, as the dust cleared and a jagged opening in the fortress wall became all too apparent. Lara nodded to herself.

"_That_," she then said simply, "is the door that _won't_ get us killed."

Tezra stared at the broken boulder at their feet, and then up at the jagged opening in the wall. "You're sure about that?" he asked. "I liked the other doors better."

Lara gave him another sideways look. "Each one was a trap," she explained. "The most ornate one, the most important looking, was the nastiest of them all. _All_ of the plainly apparent doorways along the outer wall of this fortress are traps, or dead ends. The whole idea was to shift our attention away from where we really needed to be, which was right here. The plainly obvious can be a dangerous mistress sometimes, but, as you now know, there are many different levels of 'obvious'. You just need to choose which is the right one."

"My head hurts," Tezra said at contemplative length. "How did you know the real doorway was here? And how do you know _this_," he gestured toward the opening, "isn't a trap also?"

"First," Lara lectured with patience. "_This_ doorway isn't obvious. Therefore, in the context of this whole complex, it makes it the true path." Tezra nodded at the logic as she paused. "Second," Lara continued, "Look down there." She stood, walked a small distance, and pointed to the ground. Tezra followed.

Shaped into a paving stone, slick with moisture, and almost hidden beneath thriving lichen, was another bas-relief carving, appearing to be circular points connected by thin lines in a network of some sort, almost reminiscent of a starsign of the zodiac. Again, it was barely noticeable.

"I'll be damned!" Tezra blurted with dawning comprehension. "It's a map isn't it?"

Lara nodded. "It shows the locations of all the trigger points needed to open the door, _and_ the order in which to trigger them."

"It does?" Tezra clearly wasn't convinced.

"It does," Lara confirmed simply, but with a subtly devious expression. "Now," she continued in a much brighter tone, her attention turned toward the newly opened hole in the wall. "Are you up for a little exploring?"

Tezra followed her gaze and regarded the jagged opening with trepidation. "There'll be other traps in there, wont there?"

"Yes," Lara replied assuredly. "You can bet your life on it."

"I really wish you hadn't put it that way," he replied with resignation.


	10. Prey Hunter Part III

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**Well. Here I go again, changing things around at the last minute. See, what I was going to do was keep this on ice for another fortnight. Then come back and see what I really thought about it. But then I told myself I was stalling, and that I just needed to get it out there to see what other people thought. In the end it's not all bad. But I can tell you I rewrote the ending no less than three times. The end of this update that is, the end of the story is waaaaaay off yet. There's a full truckload of good stories being posted in the Tomb Raider section at the moment, which is _really_ great to see! **

**Okay! So I took another month (with interest) to write this update! You could sue me if you really wanted a few worthless possessions! The truth is that the first draft needed work. So I worked, and worked, and worked. Maybe, damn it, I worked a bit too much and skewed the story out of all sane whack. But! I think not! You be the judge!**

**Usually I reply to any reviews written. What can I say? I'm a nice guy!  
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**Please tell me what you think. Even if you didn't exactly like what you read. Of course if you _did_ like what you read then _I wanna know!_ :)**

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***6***

**PREY HUNTER**

Part Three**  
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**S**ilent gloom hung about the two human figures like a mist as they stepped carefully along a masterfully crafted passageway, the first people to do so in over four hundred years. Both sweated, despite the fact the human-built passageway took a course through solid bedrock, cooling the air around them to temperatures that reminded Lara of a spirited seabreeze wafting off the ocean along the west coast of Australia. Subtle breathing airflows, typical of large underground labyrinthine networks, strengthened the cooling sensation, a faint wind drifting past their faces and evaporating any moisture found there. The smells of moist earth gave the place an aura of the deeply remote, and a distinct sensation of the long forgotten. Not a single sign of recent habitation could be seen anywhere along the finely-crafted stone walls, nor along the smooth, dust covered pink-granite stone beneath their feet.

With Lara in the lead, and Tezra following a few paces behind, they threaded their way through what could only be described as a bizarre and highly ornate series of underground hallways and narrow vaulted galleries. Along the walls of each, exquisite bas-relief carvings and highly decorative painted frescoes dripped from the stone with such detail that both explorers could not help but linger and glide their torchbeams over every surface contained therein.

Lara was dumbfounded, as if she'd stumbled across the mystical Shangri-La itself. The sheer interplays of colour within the frescoes, and the intricately skilled finesse that shaped the carvings, almost seemed to breathe a living soul into each of the artworks she gazed upon. She felt a deep sense of sadness, however, as each gallery came to an inevitable end, knowing full well that truly appreciative eyes may never gaze upon the wonders just witnessed ever again. Most likely, the works would be chiselled from the walls by enterprising artifact theft rings, and sold to the highest bidder for massive profit. Eventually, a pitiful few would trickle through to those museums with enough funding to pluck them free from the clutches of the black market, but likely having sustained uncaring and careless damage in the process. The rest would simply disappear into the shady rings of unscrupulous art dealers, and wealthy artifact collectors, who held little regard for the world at large. Such people cared only for themselves, valuing the fact that something unique and highly sought after belonged to them, leaving the rest of the world completely unknowing about the wonders they held in their livingrooms.

As the last of the carvings in the current gallery entered the darkness once more, Lara tentatively stepped through a gothic-styled pointed arch doorway at its end, her pointed gaze locked on her LED lightbeam, watching for anything out of place, or even slightly sinister in appearance. Tezra simply stared about himself in open-mouthed wonder, occasionally shaking his head involuntarily, as if suspecting what he saw was somehow not real, or perhaps a shadow of his imagination.

"I simply can't believe," Tezra breathed in awe, "that such a place has lain undiscovered for so long. These treasures buried here, unknown to mankind for centuries."

Lara glanced across to where Tezra had focussed the beam of his torch upon the wall, no more than a few meters from the archway. Illuminated, were three extremely detailed floor to ceiling panels, each depicting scenes of ancient Rome with such accuracy that her breath momentarily stilled to the barest hint. A man stood on the summit of a large hill serenely playing a lyre as flames tore mercilessly through the ancient city surrounding him. The flames almost seemed to move, writhe, and flicker as the moving torchlight created subtle shadows within the many undulations carved into the stone. Lara could not help but become transfixed by such a fine display, a subtle, appreciative smile lighting up her face as she studied the masterworks. The next panel, and the man, with arms upraised, stood within a magnificent street in the process of construction, the last tendrils of smoke from the fire still weaving throughout the streetscape like lengthy ribbons caught in a subtle breeze. The third was a scene of destructive murder; several helpless men fought in vain to fend off muscled lions in the centre of a grand amphitheatre, crowds stood in the background willing the bloodletting to continue to it's grisly end. The man with the lyre stood prominently in the crowds on a raised dais, his rich robes fluttering in the Roman breeze as he looked upon the scene without expression.

"Whoever built this place had a good reason to keep it hidden," Lara theorized. "This," she nodded toward the carvings, "is most certainly the burning of Rome." She pointed to the man with the lyre in the first scene. "Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus," she identified, "is thought to have orchestrated the burning of Rome in 64 AD." She pointed to the second scene. "From the ashes of the fire rose a more spectacular Rome, a city made of marble and stone with wide streets, pedestrian arcades, and ample supplies of water to quell any future blaze." Mind deep in thought, she then motioned to the third panel without regarding it. "To deflect suspicions away from himself, Nero blamed the Christians, and is said to have thrown many to the lions as scapegoats, others, he crucified and burned to push home the point that he was not the one responsible for the fires."

Tezra nodded, recalling the story from his formative years as a student, simultaneously impressed at Lara's seemingly endless database of knowledge kept hidden away within her mind. "If I recall properly, it was proven that Nero wasn't even _in_ Rome when the fires broke out. Wasn't it? The story of the madman playing the lyre while Rome burned was invented sometime later, after the fact. So why portray _this_," he gestured at the carvings, " version of events here?"

"It depends _who_ you believe," Lara replied. "We only know about historical events that were recorded in some way; written about, or set down in some picture form like these images here. Who's to say that any one person's version of events is more accurate than another's? Politics, intrigue, and plotting were all alive and well in ancient Rome, you can rest assured of that. Who knows what the real truth was?"

"Point taken, I guess we'll never know."

Lara swept her torchlight up to the ceiling, and then along the floor at their feet in a general search of the area. "What I want to know is," she asked, " _who_ was able to arrive in South America with knowledge of these events, and then record them on this wall?" She pointed at Tezra with her free hand. "If your story is indeed true, about this place being built in the fifteen-hundreds, by your ancestors fleeing the Spanish Conquistadors, then how did they have any knowledge of something that happened in 64 AD? Am I to believe your ancestors could see into the past as well as the future?"

It was a divination that Tezra hadn't expected her to make. He knew that telling Lara too much about his people and the forgotten knowledge they once had could have serious repercussions. Would she become power hungry herself, he pondered? Just like the corrupted Cortez and his minions? Would she attempt to tell the world about her discoveries? Perhaps an attempt at some sort of lion-hearted gesture of goodwill, wanting everybody to gain access to new found technologies, to cure some plight or other. He simply couldn't allow it, and replied to her with feigned frustration.

"It's possible," he began with a sigh that was almost genuine. "There are now gaping holes in our knowledge of the technologies the Guild of Scholars developed before the Spanish arrived. It was all lost with the reed ships that disappeared into the Amazon." No lie had passed his lips. That was indeed the truth; he just left unsaid Thonapa's strong suspicion that their ancestors could indeed open a window into the past, as well as the future, the images before them seeing to add weight to the argument.

Lara didn't reply immediately; her internal musings kept quietly to herself, and her expression subtly unreadable. She stood with feet planted, her free hand resting at her midriff, her eyes locked once again on the image of Nero, but her true sight pensively elsewhere.

Tezra wished vehemently for an insight into her thoughts. He had acted the fool, somewhat, since their first meeting back in the courtyard by the demon heads, and he could only hope that Lara hadn't picked up on the fact. Better to let Lara think of him as her inferior for now, he thought, rather than set her already-suspicious mind further on guard. His own mind had now mostly cleared from the after-effects of the dart poison, Thonapa having prescribed further remedies over the phone to help, and he felt his full mental faculties returning. His leg however, still hurt like the demons of hell. Exactly how far he could toy with Lara, using all his wiles, he simply had no idea; he knew he'd need to be careful.

Lara's lips again curled at the edges into a private, contemplative smile, and she voiced her long-running suspicion. "Surely you must have some idea?"

"Nothing solid I'm afraid."

"_That_ must be pretty frustrating."

"You've no idea," Tezra said with a nod, and his best long-suffering look toward her.

Lara shot him an appraising look, before shining her torch further up the passageway with the intention they get moving again. She was about to suggest they should do so, but something the torch had briefly flashed over had tagged an imprint on the ever-working thoughts in her mind. She frowned, and slowly bought the torchbeam back along the wall, until it illuminated a large fresco with deep and rich colours, once again extending from floor to vaulted ceiling. Intrigue crept through her consciousness, and she almost stalked toward the painted wall, cautiously, and with steps of carefully placed precision.

Catching the interest in her eyes, and putting his reservations aside, Tezra added his torchlight to Lara's, and hastened to keep pace beside her.

"Something caught your eye?" he asked, curious about what made the fresco caught in her torchbeam any different from the number of others they had seen.

They stepped several paces closer before Lara slowly halted, her crystal clear eyes examining every minute detail contained within the image on the wall before them. Suddenly, she became frozen granite, comprehension dawning within her like a rushing avalanche, borne of many years taunting danger in its purest form.

"Tezra!" she commanded in a low and authorative voice. "_Stop! Stay where you are. Don't move a muscle._"

Tezra had continued to pace forward after Lara had ceased, and took three additional uncomprehending steps forward, after she had spoken, not having fully heard her.

"What?" he casually threw back at her, his eyes narrowing in askance.

Lara yelled urgently at him this time, to get the message home. "_**I said stay where you are!**_" She then moderated her tone, as if abashed at her sudden harshness, but still kept her voice filled with dire warning. "_That fresco is dangerous!_" Her free hand rose to point at the image as the words passed her set lips, as if to accuse it of some heinous crime.

Tezra abruptly halted, although with skittish steps at the sudden onslaught of Lara's cutting voice. It was a voice he'd never thought possible from a woman with such feminine mystique. He whipped his head back to regard her, saw the granite-hard bent in her shining green eyes, then, like lightening, shot his gaze back to the fresco with knife-edged uncertainty.

"What the – are you – what do you mean _dangerous_?" He searched the richly precise splashes of skilfully placed colour before his eyes, trying to define the threat, but a sudden unsure panic worked to ruin his usually clear thoughts. He simply _wasn't_ in his element, and his unsure reaction to events out of his control once again frustrated him.

Lara instantly recognised the telltale signs of a mind in unsure flux. "Tezra," she said with icy calm. "Just stop, take a deep breath, and _look_ at what that fresco is depicting. But _do_ – _not_ – _move!_"

Tezra did as instructed, although he was clearly rankled at being told what to do. Another valuable insight into his character that Lara banked away with barely a flicker of her long-lashed eyelids.

Tezra studied the image after his deep breath had been expelled. "It's Nero again," he said eventually, with mystified thought. "It looks like he's chiselling out Egyptian statues of some kind – or something similar. I don't – I can't – I can't see any threat in that." He looked back into Lara's unwavering centre of calm, perplexed.

Lara drilled the fresco with a hard-edged accusatory stare. She explained, but her eyes never shifted from Nero at his labours. "Correct," she began. "They most certainly _are_ Egyptian statues. More precisely, they are the statues of King Ramesses the Second and his favoured wife, Nefertari, at the so-called 'Small Temple' on the banks of the River Nile at Abu Simbel. King Ramesses had the statues built during his reign over Egypt in the thirteenth century BC, nowhere near the time of Roman Emperor Nero and his stint on the throne from 54 to 68 AD. The statues at Abu Simbel _were_ moved to higher ground in the 1960's after the construction of the Aswan High Dam, which would have left them submerged in their original positions. Once again though, nowhere near the time of, and nothing to do with, Emperor Nero of Rome." Only then did Lara flick her gaze toward Tezra, further pinning him down to the stone beneath his feet. "Dangerously odd, don't you think?"

Tezra was silent a moment, before, "Maybe Nero visited Egypt and decided to make a few changes," he offered with a couldn't-care-less shrug. "Maybe he hated King Ramesses."

"No to the first, and very possibly to the second," Lara replied in the same even tones. "Ramesses statue is unfinished," She turned back to regard the fresco and pointed. "See?"

"Maybe he's building a copy," Tezra theorized, attempting to wrest the discussion back into his favour. "Nero may have wanted to adorn the streets of the new Rome with imposing statues. Why not Ramesses?"

Lara turned a quizzical expression upon him. "He built an exact replica of the cliff face at Abu Simbel then did he?" she asked. "And then dressed people up as Egyptian slaves, and scattered them all around the statues to make them look more authentic?"

"Well…" Tezra stuttered. "He _was_ mad wasn't he? And who's to say _that_ is actually an accurate reproduction of the cliff at Abu Simbel?"

Again Lara turned to the fresco, her eyes appearing to transport her inner sight elsewhere as she regarded it. "Oh, that's the place all right," she said almost mystically. "Once you visit that place, you don't forget it."

"You've been there?"

"Guilty as charged"

"I might have known it," Tezra said with a defeated sigh. He then threw up his hands in an empty gesture. "Why is it dangerous then?" he asked. "It's just a painting over plaster."

"Ludicrous…" was the distant reply he received, Lara's mind still being rooted within another horizon.

Tezra glanced back at her. "What? Ludicrous?"

Lara remained distantly removed from the cavern in which their earthly bodies stood. "There's no way on Earth Nero had the smallest speck to do with the statues of Ramesses and Nefertari at Abu Simbel," She clarified. "And considering there have been no other flights of fantasy depicted in the galleries we've seen so far, I'd say something's definitely up. Wouldn't you?"

"Lara Lara Lara," Tezra accused with a half disbelieving chuckle and shaken head. "Clutching at straws a bit aren't you?" He took a step backward.

Suddenly, swiftly, and without mercy, Lara rushed back to the present and shouted, "NO!" She swiftly spun to face him with an expression that could have frozen the Devil. "Tezra! I told you not to –"

Her words were silenced by a massive thud that sounded from somewhere deep beneath their feet. It was heavy, angry, and sounded like a giant had delivered a massive hammer blow into the sleeping bedrock far below. The entire gallery shook, causing a fall of cracked plaster to rain down around them from the vaulted roof above.

Lara quickly moved her torch over the floor, walls, and roof of the gallery in a highly charged search. "Damn," she chastised into the darkness. "Now you've done it."

A second hammer blow rocked the gallery, with a little more gusto than the first.

Tezra also whipped his torch around in quick, sporadic searches. "Me?" he shot back defensively. "This has nothing to do with me!"

Lara wrenched her torchbeam around to illuminate Tezra's feet. "Trapped floor," she said, cocking her head to the side to listen more intently to the newly arrived sounds of chaos.

Tezra looked down and felt like a useless child. A small square tile had indeed been depressed by his wayward backward-stepping footfall. Almost completely hidden, and nigh on imperceptible, it had been cleverly mixed in with countless other pink stone tiles covering the floor. He ruthlessly, inwardly, berated himself for being so careless; he wasn't used to having to rely on another so completely. Until this day he'd been his own man and self sufficient in all things, but that had now changed, seemingly in one fell swoop.

A loud crack, like thunder, rocked the gallery in a vicious pressure wave. The ground shuddered; the giant with the hammer was nowhere near finished, not yet it seemed.

Tezra had to raise his voice to be heard as they both stumbled for balance. "Well this isn't good is it? What the _hell_ do you suggest we do now?"

Almost as soon as the question was finished, battered sections of the floor surrounding them began to drop away, and disappear into deep voids of blackness amid the sounds of cracking and tortured bedrock. One moment the gallery seemed whole, the next, they were caught in a scene of chaotic turmoil, their ears filled with the sounds of imminent doom.

"Run!" Lara yelled in answer, before she took off herself in a full-blooded sprint toward the far end of the gallery.

Ignoring the stabbing nerves in his leg Tezra could do nothing more than follow suit, death, in a very violent manner, would be the sure consequence if he did not.

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**L**ara's heart rate flared upward within seconds to fight an adrenalin-fuelled war with the unrelenting chaos erupting around her. The gallery, that had moments before been a picture of quiet, contemplative silence, had now turned on a dime into a dark pit of destructive and shuddering upheaval, threatening to wink the two humans within from existence without a second's extra thought. The speed at which the gallery was destroying itself left Lara with no time to check on Tezra's welfare, and she could only hope he followed behind close upon her heels. Forgiving herself for his death would be a difficult task, she knew, especially if there was even the smallest chance she might be able to prevent it. Although Lara could be ruthless and iron-willed when necessary, there _was_ a human inside her, who could feel pain, loss, and the biting needles of defeat when things went mortally awry. In fact, those emotions, it seemed, bubbled away in various mixes inside her constantly, but healthily mixed with euphoria, indulgence, and the odd bout of deviousness when it was called for. Another death on her shoulders however, Lara thought, may well stretch her current mental balance perilously thin.

The roiling stone floor was now completely unstable, with massive sections cracking like shattered ice before simply dropping away to be forever swallowed into the dark centre of the earth. Lara fought for balance, the upheaval of the remaining sections of solid floor acting to throw her off course like a crash-tackling hit-man with nothing more than violent death on his mind. A section ahead of her violently splintered as if hammered from below by demons of the depths, before it savagely exploded upward in ragged pieces and ceased to exist in an angry swarm of debris. Heartbeat continuing to scream, Lara vaulted the yawing chasm that now stood in place of the floor, but was assaulted by chunks of rock and plaster that dropped from the ceiling like lead-weight depth charges seeking to halt her forward momentum.

Her boots caught the opposite side with a solid thunk despite the assault, but she immediately felt her salvation shift ruinously beneath her feet, certainly also within the throes of disappearing forever. No time existed to take stock, and decisions fired within her like a gattling gun. She vaulted across another three gaping black holes, grimly aware of Tezra's pained shouts from somewhere behind, before she reached what appeared to be the head of the destruction as it worked it's way along the length of the gallery.

Lara's boots again thunked down, this time on the as-yet solid floor, but only to remain so for seconds at best. With her face gritted, she bolted, her braid trailing through the onrushing air as she went, until she spied the distinctive pointed-arch doorway marking the end of the gallery appear amid the flailing maelstrom. Powder-fine dust, ripped into the air by the anarchy, caught and brutishly killed Lara's torchlight, making the archway only a dim and earthen-coloured feature battling to appear through the mire.

Again, something gatecrashed a warning across her sorely beset thoughts. Schooled to listen to her perceptions, Lara peered at the now rapidly approaching doorway as she sped toward it, focussing on what had fired off the warning in her mind. Another instant, and her question was answered with a crushing realisation that the doorway was solidly barred, by what appeared to be a solid stone slab that had descended down to the floor from the ceiling above and now blocked any passage through.

Panic rose, but Lara pushed it away with a clinical ruthlessness that had saved her countless times before. Even as she slid to a dusty stop before the barred exit, she was examining the wall carvings on both the stone slab itself, and on the wall to each side of the archway it now blocked. There was a message there to be read, subtly present, and easily missed, but to Lara the details screamed across her consciousness in full-formed clarity. First, she heavily stomped down on a barely-raised pressure plate to her left, the quiet noise of its subsidence lost amid the fully-fledged destruction of the gallery around her. Another quick glance at a series of glyphs on the descended stone slab, and Lara bounded catlike to the wall on the opposite side, finding a tile had immeasurably moved out from the painted fresco there. She slammed the tile with a lethal roundhouse kick that would have felled the toughest son-of-a-bitch goon in a biting instant, and left him with expensive facial reconstruction bills to boot. The tile reacted, sliding smoothly into the wall until a square opening was left within.

Tezra shouted with full throated panic from somewhere within the flying destruction further back in the gallery, but Lara knew if she didn't complete the riddle of their locked way out, they'd both end up a beaten pulp at the bottom of the dark abyss opening up below them. The destruction crashed closer as Lara again peered at the glyphs and carvings around the door, before squatting down to reach into the newly opened cavity in the wall. Inside, she felt along the length of the square opening until her gloved hand made contact with a metallic handhold, a pullswitch of some sort. Lara braced her feet against the wall, and, with quick breaths of stressed effort, pulled on the handhold with every ounce of strength she could muster.

The pullswitch moved with an initial jolt, but then stuck fast as if it were welded to the stone inside the cavity. A quick check of the doorway told Lara that nothing was yet happening in regard to the door opening again; the switch must still have further to come. Right arm and both her legs taut as granite, Lara pulled on the switch for all she was worth, until she was sure her muscles would pop and shatter at any moment. Tezra, bloodied, appeared at her back and spoke with stressed words.

"Lara! What in Gods name are you doing? We have to get out of here!"

"Busy!" she gritted out from her strained jawline.

"Damn it Lara! We're both fucking dead!"

Suddenly, with a squealing metallic grind, and a final gargantuan effort on Lara's part, the switch released its deathgrip on whatever had resolutely refused to allow it to move until now. She jolted back and ended up sitting on her behind with the sudden movement, but quickly spun around into a stand with a move borne of pure martial-art technique.

"_You_ can fucking die if you feel like it!" she vented back at Tezra. "But I'm getting the hell out of here!" With that she spun to face the stone slab blocking the doorway, and the ever-widening gap that was now opening up beneath it. Instead of moving to slide under the slab however, Lara reached out and took a precarious rock-climbers hold of the raised edge that ran around the outside archway, forming part of the artistic detail with which it was constructed. Her purchase on the small protrusion wasn't perfect, but, being a better than average rock climber, Lara knew she could hold herself midair for a few minutes with the grip.

"Get your ass under the door!" Lara yelled. "Now!"

Tezra needed no further prodding; he quickly scampered over to the slowly rising slab, squatted down next to it, and waited for what seemed like an eternity, until the gap beneath became large enough for him to wedge himself through. Even as he wriggled beneath the stone door, the entire gallery lurched yet again with violent force, as if the hidden giant had taken to shaking it instead of raining down blows with his giant hammer. The sections of flooring that remained in front of the archway tumbled away before Lara's eyes, and became lost in the blackness of the abyss below, disappearing forever; leaving only a thin ledge remaining by the doorway.

The destructive tremors continued to rampage through the tattered remains of the gallery as Lara hung over the black pit now opened up below her, their intensity ever-building to what could surely only end in a grand finale of complete destruction.

Lara's grip shifted perilously as the wall she clung to began to fall apart, coating her in dust, and showering her with ancient plaster and sizable chips of older-still granite bedrock.

"_Move your behind!_" Lara yelled down at Tezra's legs as they scrabbled for purchase beneath the door. She could wait no longer; her handhold was being shaken apart.

Lara, facing the doorway, dropped into space, but her freefall only lived for a second, because her outstretched hands caught the broken lip of the ledge still remaining at the base of the doorway. A second later still, after her long-practised hands gripped, the rest of her body slammed into the jagged rock wall below the door as her downward momentum arched in toward it, raising bruises in places that never ought to cop such a beating. Another pummelling to massage out later, Lara thought grimly.

Tezra called from beyond the blackness on the other side of the crumbling archway. "Lara! You still there? Shift your butt cheeks!" His voice was thick with strain.

Lara heaved herself up to the top of the ledge, then swung a boot up over it as well, and wedged it against the side of the archway. Scrabbling, her other boot caught purchase on a soon-to-disappear boulder that protruded from the abyss wall close by, and, using the support gained, rolled herself over onto the ledge with a heave heavily influenced by her pumping adrenalin. No sooner had she reached the sanctity of the ledge, Lara rolled through the gap under the now-halted stone slab amid a roiling cloud of dust and destructive flying rock pieces.

"It takes more than total chaos to get rid of _me_," Lara said with an edge, as she sat up under the focussed beam of Tezra's Maglite.

"You look like a damn Yeti," Tezra grinned down at her. "I hope all that muck you're covered with has cosmetic properties?"

"I should be so lucky," Lara muttered.

Picking herself up from the gritted floor, Lara unclipped her LED Lenser from its shoulder mounting, and took stock of their surroundings. She discovered she was almost completely white, face and all, with a thick, sticking layer of powdery dust that reminded her of demolition sites, or the ash fallout from erupting volcanoes. She attempted to brush herself down, but it was a futile effort.

"I think I need a swim." Lara said, inspecting her dust-infused braid, and then shaking it to produce a fall of dust and grit.

"You might just get one." Tezra replied, aiming his torch out into the cavern they had just entered.

Dull rumblings continued to boom at their backs, the sounds seeping through the half opened door and tremoring wall behind them. Ahead was another abyss that swallowed the beams of their torches as if they were no more than playthings, but, heading off into the darkness above it, was a precarious-looking rope bridge. Lara also noted the airborne mist that rose up from the unknown blackness below them, and the faint, echoing sounds of distant rapids that could only signify the presence of an underground river.

Lara ran her torch along the rope bridge as far as the beam would reach; it appeared to continue on into the void beyond the reach of the light. "This could be interesting." She said then at length.

"_Suicide_ was the word that sprang into my mind," Tezra said dryly.

"You had the other way in mind then?"

"What other way?"

"Exactly," Lara replied, glancing across at him with a dusty look.

Tezra sighed. "You're right of course, Ms Croft. I suppose I was hoping for a cable car." Then he motioned across to the rope bridge. "Shall I kill myself first?"

"No," Lara said with half hidden smile. "Ladies first, don't you know."

"I knew there was an upside to being a gentleman," Tezra said with a half smile of his own, but the other half was all grimace.

Slowly, they worked their way out onto the bridge, causing it to sway slightly with their added weight and shifting momentums. Lara noted the 'rope' appeared solid, almost modern, and not the sort made from jungle vines or woven from fibrous jungle plants, like she'd expected. It was smooth to the touch, and could have been nylon, yet it had a texture that pronounced otherwise. Also, instead of the usual rotting boards at their feet, they stood on a strange black metal that seemed to lustre with a resinous quality and reflect their torchbeams as if it were frozen liquid. Neither of them felt like stopping to inspect the materials more closely however, preferring to get a move on while the going was good.

"Seems solid enough," Tezra said with thinly veiled nervousness.

"Whoever built it knew how to make rope bridges, that's for sure." Lara replied, with obvious admiration. "I know several places that could really do with one like this."

"If I'm still alive on the other side, I'll share in your praise." Tezra said. "But for now, I'm not convinced."

Lara led the way across the bridge for several minutes; calling a halt several times to allow the swaying structure to settle, before continuing cautiously forward. They passed through a breezing curtain of mist, and heard angry rapids far below them in the dark, laving Lara in no doubt they were passing over a subterranean waterfall of substantial size and energy. The mist only served to turn portions of Lara's dusty coating to a sticky paste, and once again severely shorten the penetration of their torches.

Massive stone columns began to materialise within the limits of their torchlight, their shape and structure making it clear to Lara they were ages old stalactites and stalagmites that had met mid-chamber in ages past, and then continued to slowly build into the imposing monoliths they now were. It was clear they were now inside a massive subterranean river chamber, that rushing water had been working at chiselling out for thousands of years. Lara surmised that the ancient builders of the carved galleries, along with the rope bridge itself, must have discovered the river chamber during their excavations long ago and thought it useful for some purpose or other. Exactly what that purpose was, she couldn't even begin to fathom.

Although it creaked and protested at various points, the rope bridge held firm, and the beckoning cliffs of the opposite river chamber wall eventually appeared through the misty gloom. Lara stepped off the bridge and onto the solid ground of a wide manmade ledge that had been somehow cut into the solid bedrock lining the sheer cliffs of the cavern wall. For builders working so long ago, Lara mused, the construction logistics of such work must have been a nightmare. Tezra sighed with resplendent relief when his boots hit solid ground.

"Ahh, sweet Mother Earth," he said as a bucketload of stress lifted from his shoulders. "How I love thee."

Lara arced her torch out across the open expanse of blackness through which they had just come, dimly illuminating the stone columns they had passed by earlier, but otherwise only catching the rope bridge within the massive void. The chamber roof was also lost above in the blackness, simply nowhere to be seen when Lara angled her torch upward. Inescapable, was the fact that the river chamber in which they now stood was nothing short of immense. The question, however, that immediately hit Lara, was how much of it was natural, and how much man made? She thought back to the cavern containing the cathedral façade, and how regular and smoothly shaped it had been, almost appearing too regular to be natural. Was that also the case here, she pondered? If so, then the technology used to create such a place must surely be a sight to behold.

Lara couldn't help but wonder at the extent of the cavern, and how many other subterranean worlds sprawled through the earth nearby, enveloped in their blankets of eternal darkness just waiting for explorers to arrive and be blown away by mind boggling sights of grandeur, or the intricate calcite structures typical of an underground Karst landscape. Her spirit for adventure never faded, or even dimmed the barest iota, not when places such as this simply lay waiting to be found.

Not Tezra. The freedom of adventure, and the thrill of discovering something truly unique and unexplored seemed lost on him. He looked across at Lara with an extremely relieved I'm-glad-to-be-alive smile and said, "This place seems fit only for trolls and demons of the dark. As that clearly isn't us, can I suggest we get out of here, and as far away from that rope bridge as possible?" He hiked his thumb over his shoulder to indicate the bridge behind him.

"You'd rather go back to your office?" Lara queried. She turned from the void, somewhat reluctantly, clipped her torch back to her shoulder, and regarded him with her ghost-like, dusty features.

"Just aboveground in the sunlight will do perfectly fine," Tezra replied.

"Don't you want to live a little?"

"Not buried alive I don't." Tezra's smile slowly morphed into an expression that hinted at a darker mood returning.

"Scaredy cat," Lara accused him. Then she turned to shine her light along the walkway hewn into the cliff face. "I guess we go that way," she said.

For the first ten minutes, they made good progress. There wasn't much to see, except the vast expanse of the river cavern off to their left, and the smoothly shaped limestone wall to their right. They hopped over the odd fallen rock, and manoeuvred around stalagmites, slowly, but surely in the process of reaching up toward the cavern roof, wherever that was. They came upon a series of calcite straws dangling from the darkness that seemed clustered with stunning crystals that glinted and sparkled under the light of their torches. Lara lingered, as if studying a Van-Gough. Tezra was impatient to get moving.

They then came to a series of places where the walkway had collapsed, and where only a much thinner ledge remained for passage; they needed to flatten their backs to the wall and inch slowly along to get past. Another section required a running leap, as the collapse had not only taken out the walkway, but a large section of limestone wall as well. Lara nimbly vaulted the gap without a second thought, her white-dusted form, it seemed to Tezra, appeared to float across the void as if she had wings. Tezra took a running leap and landed heavily, painfully tweaking his already injured leg that never felt completely happy in the first place.

Eventually, after several more such traversals, Lara noted the rock type change suddenly along a distinct horizon, into an almost night-black basalt, which also featured crystals that created pinpricks of reflected light when bathed under torchlight.

Not long after the change into basalt, Lara came to a fluid stop; switched off her torch and asked Tezra to do the same. "Turn off your torch a second."

Tezra did so, and their world changed.

It was as if the cavern had suddenly opened out into the vast starfield of heaven. Pinpoints of blue light shone in the distance, some large, some the merest tiny specks of sparkle, almost hidden amongst the subterranean dark. They slowly paced forward, awestruck, their eyes taking in the panoramic display that appeared to spread throughout the vast cavern space around them. Soon, the unearthly blue light began spidering through the dark basalt stone beside them, seeming to drift down from above as if someone had tipped liquid crystal throughout the wall and it had streamed down in erratic tracks before solidifying. Lara was in no doubt it was the same crystal she had first seen in the trapped passageway, and later in the subterranean forest. It glowed with the same crystal-blue that seemed generated from within, and spilled out to illuminate the wall close by.

"In all my life," Tezra breathed, "I have never once seen the likes of this." He turned on the spot slowly, gazing in astonishment at the ethereal beauty of the crystal light display.

Lara stood silently, her body completely stilled, her eyes being all that moved as they went from one light cluster to the next, drinking in their splendour. Moments like this were exactly the ones that drove her onward, and gave her life purpose. Again she wondered what other spectacles might yet remain to be found within this network of passageways and caverns, and vowed to return to find out once this whole shady business was finished with. "You should explore a little more," she replied after a moment. "There's more to life than latte strips and the maddeningly mundane you know."

"Oh I know," Tezra agreed. "My life is far from mundane, I'll tell you right now. But I can't afford to risk it on a heck of a lot right now, there's simply too much at stake. When I do choose to risk it, there has to be a decent enough pay off, either for me, or for my people. Grand spectacles don't quite cut it I'm afraid."

"Your loss Mr Tekkara," Lara said with a hint of sorrow. "But I understand your predicament, just don't let life pass you by without at least a little sightseeing."

Tezra nodded at Lara's sage advice, before they both continued along the pathway cut into the subterranean cliff. The mystically glowing crystal continued for some minutes as they went, but ever the wary explorer, Lara resumed scanning the ground with her faithful LED torch, along with the smooth stone wall to their right. She wasn't about to let her guard wane, no matter what the distractions were that might seek to take her focus elsewhere.

They soon came upon such a large cluster of crystal-tracks within the dark basalt wall that they no longer needed their torches in any case. The entire wall seemed to glow from a tangled mass of lines, some haphazardly jagged, others smooth and fluid, as if a drunken spider had spun several crystal webs throughout the rock, and changed tack half way through. They rounded a gently curving corner, and as Lara's gaze glided over the new sections of wall coming into view, her mouth fell open in unabashed astonishment.

There was another pointed arch doorway cut into the rock, the passageway, or room beyond, leading directly off into the basalt cliff. Around the doorway, the glowing crystal lines no longer appeared haphazard; they had been specifically shaped, into a scrolling pattern of Celtic-style patterns. Added to that, the stone, complete with intruded crystal, had been carved into bas-relief to produce raised patterns and identifiable shapes. A flowering vine appeared to twist and weave around the perimeter of the archway, as if a living forest plant guarded the doorway in a frozen bubble of time. Lara slowly stepped to regard the archway from directly in front, and tingling spines of disbelief suddenly skewered throughout her entire body.

"_Jesus Christ!"_ The words spilled from her lips as if she'd peered through a window into the chaotic underworld of the tortured dead.

Tezra stopped beside her, his breath suddenly freezing within his lungs. "Now," he stammered, "there's a damn twist."

Lara stood, rigid, desperately searching for a logical explanation to what she saw. A sick joke? A trap? Some Goddamned elaborate hoax perhaps? Her mind dismissed each option even before the thoughts were fully formed. The place was clearly too old for any such theories to hold water. Either that, or somebody had gone to great lengths indeed to lure her to this very point, carefully crafting everything up until this location to appear genuine. Somehow, maddeningly, Lara's ever sifting mind dismissed that thought also.

Lara rounded on Tezra. "Okay," she pressed him. "Talk! What the hell is going on?"

"You think _I_ have something to do with this?" he rebutted with firm resolve. "No, no and again – _no!_ I told you – Thonapa told you – that you were expected here. You were _supposed_ to come here! This is _proof_ of that!"

Lara fixed him a high-tensile-steel stare, devoid of any hint of forbearance. "Did you ever stop and think that even with modern thinking and technology, what you're asking me to believe is considered _impossible!_"

"I think about it _every day_ Lara! Every _goddamn_ day! I don't know how, and I _don't_ know why, but those Inca scholars discovered a technology, and made devices that have never been seen, or even _theorized_ about since. Did you think this was a damn _picnic_ or something! This has _massive_ consequences Lara! _Massive!_ And if this technology gets into the wrong hands – then only Armageddon can result!" Tezra did not smile, or seem to concoct the words. He was deadly serious.

Lara spun back to the archway, not sure what on Gods Earth to believe. Inescapable however, was the fact that the name '_Lara Croft'_ was carved into the crystal above the point of the arch. Her own name glowed, as if chiselled and crafted into the rock by mystic hands. No words existed then to describe what she felt, and, for the first time she could remember, she found herself hesitant to go any further, fearful that something beyond the door might dig into her past and open old wounds.

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	11. Affliction of Darkness Part I

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**Well. I don't know what to say. Life can be a Biatch. Let's just leave it at that shall we?**

**This portion of Chapter 7 has actually been written a while. I wrote this and then I simply had to leave the project in limbo a while. And it sat, and sat, and sat there. The real benefit is, that it all completely slipped from my mind, and I was able to come back and truly give it a proper editing. Parts that were glaringly missing were added, and parts that really didn't need to be there were quashed without mercy. Not a bad tactic truth be told.  
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**This is by far the smallest update I've posted to date. Them's the breaks. Actually, as you might guess, there's a lot more to this little sequence of events yet to come, and in the next few weeks I'm hoping to get a lot further along with it. That is - of course - unless a HUGE angry mob assembles outside my front door demanding I stop torturing the world. I'll be testing my potato gun for a while if that happens... :) So apologies for the all-too-brief update, it's all I've been able to manage for a decent while. Just so you all know that Journey is far from dead.  
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**So - read! And see what you think. Leave me a review too ..._ Please_**

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***7***

**Affliction of Darkness**

**-Part 1-**

**Somewhere Over the Amazon**

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**Seheira's** world was dark and claustrophobic, her drunken swimming thoughts unable to comprehend and piece together the information her deadened senses recorded. Dimly, she became aware of a loud thundering racket, as if someone had parked a road train nearby and forgotten to attach its exhaust system before they'd left home. Capriciously, she admonished the idiot responsible. No self respecting truck driver would do such a thing, surely to god.

Her entire body lurched and jolted, as if she were back aboard her father's fishing trawler - with a black storm bearing down upon them and whipping up the seas, and causing the vessel to pitch and roll sharply amid the animated angry swells. Fussy as damnation however, she knew her father would never throw the trawler's ungodly-expensive turbodiesel engine exhaust into the sea, unless age really _was_ finally catching up with him. Confused, and deathly tired, she sank inexorably back into the silken unconsciousness of sleep.

Indeterminable time passed, whether five hours or five minutes, Seheira had no clue, just a strong feeling that time _had_ passed. Pain began to fire from several locations around her body as she gradually lifted from the hazy pit of stupefaction, her midriff a source of cutting pain, and her neck featuring an ache she wouldn't wish upon her worst enemy. Muffled voices seemed to come from somewhere close by, heavily mixed with the sounds of rushing wind, and all but unintelligible over the din of the exhaustless-sounding engines that seemed to echo between her eardrums.

Slitting open a ponderously heavy eyelid, Seheira soon discovered she lay dumped on the floor inside a small room with curved walls to the left and right, and smallish wooden doors at either end. Muted light spilled weakly through small oval-shaped windows built into each of the curved metallic walls, and she breathed a tired sigh of relief with the realisation that she wasn't sequestered in some sort of hidden underground holding cell someplace – like she'd feared.

Her arms didn't seem to move as expected, and Seheira quickly discovered her wrists had been solidly bound with heavy black cable ties, pulled tight enough to put her blood circulation under serious pressure. Attempting to move her legs, she found they also refused to respond as commanded, and heavily suspected the same hefty cable ties had been put to work there as well. A rough-spun grey woollen blanket – feeling half weaved from rusty barbed wire – covered the lower half of her body and obscured her legs from view. Hardly the damn Hilton, Seheira thought.

Double fisted, she reached up to clear long blonde strands from her field of view, and get a better look at her surroundings. A voice softly responded to her obvious return to the land of the living.

"Welcome to back to paradise compadre," it said with mock humour. "If you feel even a quarter as bad as me, then you have my full sympathy. Don't ask for a hug though, I feel like I ate a sack of steak knives for breakfast."

Stan Forde looked as though he'd fit right in amongst earthquake disaster victims. He sported a rough bandage across his head, smeared red with blood, and another similarly coloured bandage wound up his entire left forearm. Older wounds lay hidden beneath his Foxhound uniform, which now appeared ripped, grime infused, and decidedly worse for wear. His ever-present roguish grin however, despite his pummelled-looking condition, refused to be beaten down. He was sitting opposite her in a small canvas seat, similarly trussed with the same heavy cable ties, and was regarding her with an affable look of appraisal.

Seheira twisted her head around toward him, immediately regretting the move as pain spiked throughout her splintering-stiff neck, but was glad to hear Stan's friendly voice again. "I feel like I ate the whole freaking knife shop," she grimaced, "and then went next door to the lawn-mower section for dessert." She then blinked her eyes several times and looked around the small space. "Where the hell are we?" she asked after the brief survey. "The broom closet of a junkyard or something?"

"Don't think I'm mad when I say this," Stan answered in bemusement, as if he could hardly believe his own words. "To cap off the strangest day I've ever had, it seems we're aboard no less than a B-17 Flying Fortress airplane, complete with enough goons and fifty-calibre machine guns to start a small war."

Seheira immediately frowned, her eyes quizzically wandering about the room a second time. Suddenly the curved walls made sense. "So this isn't a hotel room then? With a spa and fully stocked minibar?"

"Afraid not. I knocked on the door for room service, but all I got was a guy with a flat-top shoving an Uzi in my face."

"And the other door?"

"His damn twin brother," Stan said frustratedly. "Seems we're caught like rats in a trap."

Seheira sat up, pushing her long hair over her shoulders, and noting for the first time that her 'blanket' covering was also draped with the spare Foxhound jacket from Stan's security car. "Okay" - Seheira's eyes hardened - "Who on Earth still flies around in old warplanes?" She thought aloud. "Flying Fortresses are World War two stuff right?"

"Damn straight," Forde agreed. "Considering how well financed this goon-squad that's chasing Lara all over the place has proven to be, I'm at a loss as to why they're resorting to B-17's. These guys _aren't_ amateurs though," he theorized, "so there's got to be a good reason behind it."

"History buffs?" Seheira offered.

"Undoubtedly," Stan thought further. "But as a frontline machine in international espionage? I don't get it."

Further talk ceased as a rolling turbulent jolt worked its way along the B-17's airframe, toppling items not secured, and giving its occupants a better-than-fair impression of a pro-gamer roller coaster ride.

"Any ideas where they're taking us?" Seheira asked eventually, as the turbulence lessened its intensity, massaging her neck muscles with her thumbs as the old warplane became stable again.

"Nothing solid," Stan answered. "But - I noted before that we're flying over dense forest. It's got to be the Amazon, or Brazil to be more precise." He gave her a look that revealed he'd guessed what their captors were up to.

Understanding then dawned in Seheira's mind also. "Lara's in Bolivia, isn't she? Right next door to Brazil!" She sighed, sure now she was correct. "We're bait – aren't we? They're going to use us as leverage to get at Lara." Seheira shook her head helplessly. "The sons of bitches!"

Forde nodded solemnly in agreeance. "What I want to know is," he asked grimly, "what the hell happens if Lara doesn't play ball? I have this nastily-bad feeling they'll start torturing us if she doesn't cooperate. Seems the logical thing for complete freaks to do."

Seheira's face became immersed in a deeply worried frown. "And how often does Lara play ball?" she worried, pulling the Foxhound jacket up tight around her shoulders. "I'll bet she doesn't like being blackmailed."

"Not a chance in hell," Forde replied, stonewalled. He then stood and peered out the small window behind him. Seheira followed suit on her side.

Deep forest passed slowly by beneath them, seen only through the occasional gaps in the cloudbank that had assembled over the immense leafy-green canopy. The sun was just now edging above the distant horizon over the tail of the B-17, but already they could see mighty rivers weaving through the early morning mist, making clear tracks through the wild and untamed jungle. They saw no evidence of human habitation, nor any boats on the waterways, their destination seeming more and more ominously far from the closest beaten track by the minute.

For a further twenty minutes they passed the time by theorizing game plans that could be used for escape, although both had to admit fleeing into the remote and dense jungle probably wasn't going to get them altogether far, neither having jungle skills of any kind. Stan was hatching out a plan that involved getting near a radio to call for help, thinking it might present their best hope, when suddenly, the drone of the four Wright Cyclone radial engines changed in pitch, and they both felt the aircraft begin to lose altitude. Immediately silenced from their whispered planning, Forde and Seheira stared at each other with building consternation.

"Seems we've arrived at the tourist resort," Stan said gamely, fixing Seheira with his best roguish grin. "I hope they can do me a glass of Veuve Clicquot, the menu on their connecting flights leaves a lot to be desired."

Seheira smiled amid tangling thoughts and emotions of dread. _Thank God I'm not alone!_

Their situation was nothing short of hopeless, yet it seemed Forde hardly noticed. Seheira couldn't help but wonder how he remained almost indifferent toward the surely-dire plans their captors had in store for them. As far as she was concerned, sure as the sun rose beyond the horizon outside, their day was about to get a whole lot worse. Yet, she drew hope from the fact that Stan remained upbeat, taking strength from his almost cocksure manner and his quick-to-appear smile. It seemed he wasn't about to get shot down in flames over such a mere thing as a kidnapping.

Though she felt the icy tingling of dread manifest through her, Seheira kept a brave face. "You don't suppose their pool is heated too do you?" she quipped, forcing another smile that amply dripped with a distinct air of I-really-don't-think-so.

Forde's grin widened. "Don't push your luck Sister. I've got a nagging feeling we aren't exactly A-list guests."

The black warplane seemed to wash off speed quickly as more jarring turbulence buffeted the old world-war-two airframe with a vengeance during descent. Both captives moved back to their small viewport windows, attempting to see exactly where the odd choice of an aircraft had delivered them. The treetops approached quickly, seeming to suddenly rise into view from a silvery-misted pit far below. The roar of the four turbo-supercharged engines shattered the serenity of the lush ecosystem, and Seheira noted a number of large gleaming-white birds take wing as they thundered noisily overhead, wishing with a passion that she and Forde could join them in their free-wheeling escape.

"I've only got jungle on my side," Seheira announced, cramming her face as close to the window as possible to gain the best view downward. "What's on your side?"

"Trees – birds – water, and God only knows what else is alive down there," said Forde without humour. "Other than that, I've got no more than you."

Helpless, and frustrated with their imprisonment, apprehension began to rise within Seheira like a wellspring. "Where the _hell_ are they taking us then?" she asked.

Forde was grimly ponderous. "No place marked on any map by the look of it," he assessed, shifting himself around in front of his window to gain different views. "There's nothing but wild forest outside in any direction I look."

Only when it seemed the B-17's wingtips would surely clip the tops of the trees, the aircraft perilously close to being torn apart by the massive forest giants that rose high into the air to meet with the tropical sunlight above, did the sea of green abruptly cease, and reveal an almost-hidden asphalt runway hardly wider than aircraft itself. An instant later, the dauntless aircraft dipped below the treeline, the already-muted sunlight fading to a misty gloom as it did so.

Almost blending with the black shadows across the runway, the black-dragon B-17 touched down like a king-maker coming home to survey it's domain, it's tyres screeching with a momentary cloud of vaporized rubber as they made contact with the tarmac. Seeming almost effortless, the machine-of-war taxied along the length of the hidden runway, before coming to a serene stop by a number of highly camouflaged buildings. Immediately, a smallish camouflaged tow vehicle raced from the shadows and parked itself in front of the lead wheel of the aircraft. Smoothly, it attached to the wheel support and began pushing the entire aircraft backward, even as the B-17's pilot began running through his shutdown sequence.

Amid the shadowed camouflage, two massive hangar-bay doors began to open as the tow vehicle manoeuvred the B-17 into position, only needing to wait momentarily as the doors opened enough to allow the old warplane past. The second it was so, the B-17 was on the move again, pushed backward into a cavernously-massive aircraft hangar that seemed to extend onward into infinity. Housed inside were several other aircraft, vehicles, and no less than six helicopters of varying size and manufacture. Only minutes had passed since the B-17 had dipped below the trees surrounding the runway outside.

Inside the hangar the racket was appalling, with the Wright Cyclones still in fine-fettle operation. One by one, they silenced as the pilot shut them down, allowing workmen nearby to remove their earmuffs and approach with a cavalcade of maintenance vehicles. Seheira looked across to Forde.

"Now the fun begins," she said with shiverous disquiet.

Forde moved to share the view out of her window, shuffling awkwardly with his cable-tied bonds. "We'll get through this compadre," he said with encouragement. "Never say never until the Devil is done."

They waited, and watched, as a busy flurry of activity occurred outside in the hangar; at any moment they expected one of the wooden doors to their prison would fly open and reveal a grim-faced thug with a love affair for firing Uzi's. They waited at least fifteen minutes, and began to hope against hope that they'd been forgotten.

When the rearward door of their little room did eventually swing open, the person filling the void was not even a shade close to what either had expected.

A stunning woman stood with an almost abashed smile, her shoulder-length deep-fire-red hair hanging loosely to her shoulders, seeming almost luminescent in the somewhat gloomed confines of the B-17. A number of black ribbons draped down over her shoulders, one falling past her model-esque face, but all seemingly attached somewhere within her striking hairstyle. She wore an equally-red minidress, which appeared so far out of place in such a location as to be nothing short of maddening. Her long legs were encased in night-black calf-high boots that seemed to accentuate every curve they dared cover. She was unarmed, except for a gleaming silver-coloured katana slung in a scabbard at her back. Her suffering smile was entirely genuine, but tinged with tendrils of sadness. When she spoke, there was not even the smallest trace of malice, evil, or twisted mind.

"I can't believe they kept you guys cooped up in the radio room for 13 hours," she said with genuine concern. "You both look like you've been whizzed through a blender and thrown out with the trash. So damn typical of them to treat you like this." She shook her head, sorrowfully, as if she wanted nothing more than to take them and flee this accursed place.

Seheira looked at Forde in astonishment, and saw the same disbelief moulded across his face as well.

"Who the hell are you?" they both blurted in unison, unable to contain the question a moment longer.

The sad smile momentarily vanished with genuine mirth. "Not what you expected?"

"What happened to Mr Uzi who refused my request for room service?" Forde ventured, completely unsure exactly whom he was dealing with.

She almost grinned then. "You asked him for room service? No wonder he stormed off as soon as the plane landed. God knows where he went, and I don't give a damn." Stan and Seheira exchanged puzzled glances before she continued. "My name is Sunset. I was a pole dancer once – but then I took a job at the wrong club. Now I'm in service to the devil incarnate."

Stan and Seheira glanced at each other yet again, as if not believing what they had heard. "You did say 'pole-dancer' didn't you?" Forde enquired.


	12. Office 43

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**Hey groovin readers!**

**Yup! I return! I had a long break. I was right in the middle of 'Affliction of Darkness' when, through necessity, I had to break off for a while. Which was nasty because I really felt like I was on a roll at the time. Really enjoyed writing that chapter. So when It came to cranking the story again, I felt I'd been away too long to do that chapter justice by continuing it there and then. What to write then? Considered doing another chapter on 'The End of the Earth', but stalled at the starting line, because I began rolling the following 'Office 43' chapter around inside my head. Like many chapters, its been forming for a while. But the question has always been how to make it interesting, as the grand majority of it was always basically going to be two shadowy figures discussing plans in a hidden room someplace. So, it was a challenge. Think it came out ok in the end, but time will tell. Who knows, I may not even like it next week, or tomorrow. So this is the first 'post intermission' work if you like.  
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**Next up, well... I gotta get back to Lara. I mean - I just gotta. Right? Seheira, Stan Forde, and Sunset can wait a while methinks.**

**So, get your Red Bull, your masseur, your caffeine, your Epica album of choice, or whatever takes your fancy... and enter the world of Office 43.**

**See ... you really can let me know what you think. I'm not going to kill you or anything. Feel free to use the words 'genuis' , 'master', and 'brilliant' as liberally as you like! :)**

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**Office 43**

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**London, England.**

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**The CIA agent** momentarily emerged from the shadows, but only momentarily, before again becoming one with the obscure black mire that surrounded him. The hour had just ticked over to 3am, and, somewhere in the distance, Big Ben announced the fact into the breezy night air. The thin cobbled lane channelled the breeze, and sent a seemingly endless stream of papery fluttering leaves scraping and spinning over the stonework like animated sprites rejoicing in the clear freshness of night. Light from a thin crescent-moon mixed with the yellowing glow of lantern-style streetlights nearby, and then threaded its way between the shadows to spill weakly throughout the almost-hidden back-alleyway.

Bluemetal eyes caught the movement within the shadows where they knew there should be none, and, with a sustained scanning of the deeply shadowed area, caught the faintest glint of light off a shiny weapon, likely a compact pistol of some sort. Big Ben completed its stately echoing chimes off in the distance and fell silent, leaving the wind to become the dominant noise generator once again. The presence behind the eyes waited, bedrock still, almost challenging the CIA operative to make a move, but nothing was forthcoming.

Agent David sat as still as a monolith. Secreted on the rooftops that lined the laneway, he sat in deep shadow of his own, between two tall chimneys that rose up as if to be square supports for the languid grey clouds drifting slowly overhead. The CIA had been attempting to tag him, and other agents from his organisation for quite some time now, almost five years now that he thought about it. Slowly, but surely, they were getting closer to the front door, and David knew it would soon be time for the organisation to move. But not quite yet, another year or so, given progress so far, should see the CIA at the front door – by which time his organisation would be long gone.

Reaching delicately into a pocket of his close-fitting black tactical pants, he found a small device, and raised a protective cover off part of it, then pressed down on a small button secreted underneath. The device vibrated softly to acknowledge the command. Ten seconds passed in airy silence, then, the sound of a metal trashcan being carelessly bumped arose from the street nearby. The noise was subtle, but loud enough to be clearly discernable from the laneway, which led away from the street. To seal the deal, a muffled clang of a loose metallic handrail sounded out five seconds later, followed by the discreet-but-discernable thudding of a heavyish wooden door being quickly closed. It had the desired effect; the CIA agent took the bait and rushed quickly for the street.

David smiled, _even the CIA aren't immune to the simplest of diversions_.

Moving quickly, David stood and lithely spirited himself across the rooftop until he reached the guttering at the edge. The gap between this building and the next was insubstantial, maybe three meters to David's reckoning. He'd always threatened to come back with a laser distance measure to know for sure, but somehow, these little quirks in his life always got relegated to the 'unimportant' bucket. The gap was vaulted in silent precision, with only the softest of thumps emanating forth as he hit a specially reinforced - and silenced - square of tiles on the roof opposite.

Three more buildings were dealt with in a similar fashion, without so much as a single tile out of place; David knew these particular rooftops with picture-perfect clarity, having made the traversal countless times before. Arriving at the edge of an open internal courtyard, David took a discreet moment to peer down into the gloomy shadows and check for any additional unwanted guests. Finding it deserted and silent as the grave, he quickly took hold of a seemingly rusted drainpipe and slid with ease down past three levels of empty apartments to the courtyard below.

The entire building had been made to appear past its prime, somewhat forgotten, and in need of serious renovations to bring it up to scratch. Inspectors would find nothing but a series of empty rooms, some with strategically placed repair work and any associated equipment - ladders, paint rollers, electric sanders – anything that added to the illusion of work underway. Other rooms remained forlorn, reminders of yesteryear, with peeling wallpaper and heavily musted air that had been brewed over many years of empty limbo. Occasionally, work on the building progressed, to keep up appearances, but the seemingly inept workmen always seemed painfully slow at their craft, and seemed to manifest other problems out of the ether as if by magic.

All was not as it seemed however. The drainpipe David had just used was only _made_ to appear like a drainpipe. Disguised with the best painted-on rust that Hollywood could provide, it was actually a solid and slippery pole that offered quick and secure passage down from the roof above. The empty apartments were a front, designed to hide, and provide a cover story, for what lay in several levels of basements beneath.

David stepped across the overgrown but hastily tidied courtyard and stood in front of an old wooden door with peeling paint and rusted hinges. The once-grand doorknob and knocker were brass, but now appeared heavily weathered and green from too many years of neglect. David reached out and used the knocker to make a complex and precisely timed series of taps and silences that could almost be mistaken for some sort of professors-club Morse code. He finished the sequence, and waited.

Instead of protesting rusty hinges that made a racket, the door moved smoothly inward without even the slightest hint of noise. Once again, the weathered wooden door was only a set piece, which had been designed to hide the six-inch-steel hydraulic security door secreted behind it. The heavily oxidised doorknocker was also actually a high-tech precision instrument. Designed to register even the slightest tap against its surface, it waited for a pre-programmed series of disturbances to occur that it knew were the key to opening the door. Even then, a complex computer program analysed the tap sequence for the smallest of irregularities, in case an unwelcome guest had figured the code. Though the sequence was the same for all agents, each had their own subtle differences in the way they tapped it out, which the security system was fully aware of. Anything different would keep the door bolted down like a bunker. To date, it had never happened.

David moved though the threshold, and, the moment a hidden laser beam caught his movement inside the building, the heavy steel door swung closed behind him and bolted shut under its own hydraulic power.

An ageing passageway straight from the 50's greeted him. God-awful red carpet – decidedly worse for wear - with faded gold trim along each side, ran up the length of the passageway and finished at a garish spearmint-green painted doorway. Two chandeliers of questionable manufacture hung in disrepair and at odd angles from the wood-paneled ceiling. Each buzzed softly and dimmed erratically, as if to suggest wiring that should have been retired years ago. Again, the musty smell of disuse hung in the air like a forlorn reminder that nobody even cared the place existed. Again though, all cleverly designed to suggest exactly that.

Giving the spearmint green doorway a wide berth, David instead went though a nondescript side doorway, and into a junk-filled room that appeared to have been collecting all manner of forgotten furniture from mismatched eras since time began. Threading through the jumble, David made for a rickety and heavily weathered double wardrobe, that appeared as if it might have done time at some sort of outdoor tractor repair shop or some such like. Warped doors, and heavily water-damaged woodwork mingled with black oil stains and sprung joinery to suggest the wardrobe's next stop might very well be the scrap heap. Curiously though, the number 43 adorned one of the doors, in the same heavily weathered brass that appeared on the building's outer door.

David had arrived at the hidden gateway to office 43.

He opened the double doors, which curiously, also didn't make the slightest of protesting noises. Stepping into the seemingly rickety wardrobe, he turned and closed the doors behind him. The second he did so, hidden cameras examined every inch of his body in a process of identification. David reached out in the darkness and touched a specific point on the woodwork beside him – a DNA collection point. Seconds ticked by as the positive ID was verified, then, without a sound, David was quickly rushed downward on a moving platform, and a false bottom flicked out into the wardrobe above him to make it appear as if he'd never been.

The ride lasted only a few seconds, before the platform abruptly slowed into a precisely engineered soft landing that would be the envy of any Otis designer on the planet. Highly polished steel doors slid open the second the platform stopped, and agent David stepped out into another world.

The space was plush, ultra-modern, and featured soft blue mood lighting that seemed to glow softly from every space along the walls. Directly in front of him was an empty black-marble reception style desk, behind which sat an enormous display panel covering the entire wall. Currently it displayed real-time footage of the ruins at Macchu Picchu in Peru, and the late afternoon sunlight that bathed the scene in an almost surreal golden glow. Silence ensued as David stood in the soft blue light taking in the scenery, he knew though, that he was far from alone.

"Planning your next holiday Vera," he asked, seemingly to no one.

A moment of teasing silence ticked by before a sultry voice answered from seemingly nowhere. "A fanciful suggestion. Especially from you, agent David, don't you think?"

"Not really," David replied, still fixated upon the sights of Macchu Picchu. "I dare to dream of better days. Give me the smallest excuse, and I'll find a deserted coral island to disappear to for a decently-long while."

"How about this?" the slinkily feminine voice answered. The massive display panel changed to show a pristine coral atoll with a smallish high-peaked island off to one side. "Jaulo Atoll, a little-known, privately owned island in the Marshall Islands. I happen to know the owner was killed two years ago in a gun raid in Southern Mexico. I'm guessing he won't be needing his island get away any time soon."

"Book me a ticket Vera, and come join me when you're done here. We can go fishing in the lagoon together."

"Agent David," Vera replied huskily," are you asking me to elope with you to a deserted coral island and leave Office 43 to the whims of some other useless woman? Shame on you! But - I have admit - the idea sounds pleasurable." With that, a holographic image of a woman wearing a grass skirt and bikini top crystallised into view, she sat with legs crossed atop the marble desk. This time, she'd given herself long tresses of surfer-girl-blonde hair that appeared recently dunked in the ocean, and then dried a while in the tropical breeze. _Vera never was one for strict formality_, David thought to himself with some amusement.

"Vera," David said playfully. "You know that Office 43 would crumble and perish without you around to keep us all from going insane. Who else could do even half of what you do?"

Vera sat running her holographic hands through her holographic hair, but her holographic eyes – blue today – were fixed on Agent David. "Nobody," she replied airily to him. "Considering that I'm actually an entire floors worth of state-of-the-art computing technology, I think you'd be hard pressed to replace me." She turned then and nodded toward the vista of Jaulo Atoll. "Good luck in getting me there as well." She sighed.

"Never say never Vera," David encouraged, "one day you might fit inside a suitcase."

Vera nodded to herself with a contemplative expression, as if considering the thought possible.

A chime sounded, again with no discernable point of origin, and ended their imaginative reverie. Vera let her hair fall from her hands and rolled her eyes.

"We don't even get five minutes to ourselves these days," she complained. "I think you'd better go on in and see the director, I have a feeling he's a little the worse for wear at the moment." She eyed the passageway leading off to the director's room and added haughtily, "A bit grumpy too!"

David nodded, and gave her a conspirational smile. "Wish me luck then," he replied, and then turned to leave.

"Good luck Agent David," Vera's voice cooed from behind him. "Oh," she quickly added, "before you go, there's something else."

David stopped and turned to regard Vera's ethereal form. "Shoot."

Vera twisted a strand of blonde hair through her fingers, and gave him a playful look. "It's good to see you again, Agent David. You don't come in here much anymore."

David almost laughed and shook his head slightly. "You're telling me, beautiful. It's good to see you again too. Enhancements and all."

Vera sultrily waved and smiled as David once again tuned toward the passageway, marvelling at the accomplishments the Office 43 programmers had built into Vera since his last visit. He'd give them hell for making her come onto him without so much as a hinted warning. _Very clever, _he thought to himself in a patronising tone; he'd get them back somehow.

Office 43 was an extremely high-tech organisation that didn't exist. It operated without the constraints of the law, and free from any political considerations that might seek to mire, or insert unnecessary caution into the operations they undertook. They were a group of free agents, that the British government could call upon when something needed doing, but really shouldn't be associated with in any way, shape, or form. They could easily go rogue, and make truckloads of easy evil money, but each person within their ranks was specially selected, had solid moral characters that forbade such dirty conduct, and had passed rigorous testing procedures designed to weed out power hungry soldiers for hire. They answered to their own collective desire to better the world, and that was enough to keep all Office 43 members sticking to a strict moral code.

Their primary role was to serve the British Government, where only a handful of select individuals knew of their existence. MI6 suspected, as did the American CIA, that _some_ sort of entity was in play, but neither had anything remotely approaching solid proof, or a solid idea about _what_ that entity was, or how it operated. Office 43 went to extraordinary lengths to keep themselves hidden, as their non-existence was exactly how they did business. Jobs came up the world over, for those who could afford them, where powerful people, or governments, needed jobs done without the world at large being any the wiser. It was their speciality, and had proven more than lucrative since their formation in the early 1980's.

Agent David softly padded along the plush blue carpet passageway, passing several polished steel doors as he went. He finally stopped before a highly polished door of carved walnut, and knocked.

The door clicked open, and David entered.

Beyond, was a decidedly spartan room. Rough, red brickwork walls were topped off by a grey concrete roof, and grey concrete floor. Gunmetal grey cabinets adorned each wall at odd intervals, seeming to have no rhyme or reason to their placement. Gone were the glowing walls and mood lighting from the passageway. Instead, a single incandescent bulb burned overtop a rough wooden workdesk, giving the room the appearance of a bomb shelter straight from the history books of world war two. The only evidence to the contrary was a large high-tech display attached to the wall on the left of the desk, and a clearly sophisticated electronic box arranged at an odd angle sitting on top of it. A standard, cheap keyboard also sat pushed to the side on top of the desk along with a veritable truckload of paperwork.

A man sat behind the desk, his rheumy eyes missing nothing as David entered and sat down in a cheap plastic deck chair on the opposite side. A constant stream of white smoke trailed upward from an expensive Cuban cigar the man held in his left hand, it lifted and curled about the bare lightbulb on the ceiling in lazily flowing clouds of aromatic presence. Deeply lined facial features, capped by a full head of closely cropped, steel-grey hair hinted at a difficult life, both from the secrets the man now kept, and from physical hardships endured in his earlier years. Grey bushy eyebrows almost hid the dulled-but-pensive olive green eyes beneath them, eyes that had witnessed much more than any mortal man should ever witness. Simply known as 'The Director' of Office 43, the man had a distinct presence of the efficient, and a man with little tolerance for bullshit. Off to one side was a hospital stand with a drip hanging from it. Clear plastic tubes delivered something-or-other into the directors arm, held in place by a military bandage. He wore a shortsleeve khaki button-up shirt and khaki tactical pants, his perpetual uniform that never changed.

David settled himself into the chair.

"CIA found the laneway did they, Agent David?" The voice was razorblade rough, hinting of throat surgery in years past.

"Fumbling blind," David replied evenly. "His offsider followed me to the end of Chakehall Street – same as before – then I disappeared into the shadows. They're conducting a systematic search of the area each time they spot us. Tonight they staked out the laneway running up beside our building. It was going to happen sooner or later."

The director nodded slowly, his ages-weary expression unreadable. "They see you?"

"Not a chance," David replied truthfully. "Their search pattern has been more than obvious, and I suspected they'd be in the laneway tonight, so I took a few extra precautions."

"Noise box hidden inside the drainage grate on Conroy Street? I'm surprised that worked?"

"These guys aren't long out of CIA school if I get the correct sense of things," David revealed, "but yes, it is scraping the bottom of the barrel somewhat."

The director took a contemplative drag on the Cuban, and slowly blew the smoke up toward the naked bulb. Then he gestured with it to make his next point. "Careful David, we don't need the CIA breathing down our necks. We're in enough trouble as it is over this whole Lara Croft affair. Speaking of which " – he reached over and hit a button on the electronic black-box sitting at the corner of the desk – "we found out where that Gods-be-damned B-17 ended up." The large display panel on the wall lit with a series of satellite photographs. An object had been circled in red on some, but others had no additional markings in evidence at all.

David leaned forward with interest. "Any intel on Ms Sahain and that Foxound security man?"

"Stan Forde?" The director filled in the name. "None. One minute the plane is up there in the sky for all to see, and the next, there's neither hide nor hair of it. We tracked it over a remote section of the Amazon in Brazil, then poof!" – the director threw up empty hands – "It disappeared. We can only assume that Forde and Ms Sahain are still on board – somewhere in Brazil."

David let go a heavy breath, then pondered out aloud. "So it landed somewhere in the jungle, some hidden airstrip that's difficult to see – or got missed by the satellite imagery?"

"They're extremely efficient if that's the case," the director replied, nodding at the images on the wall. "There was only ten minutes between the last still that tagged them and the next one that couldn't. They'd have had to land the plane, then hide it quicksmart between shots."

"Any decent outfit knows when most of the satellites fly overhead," David pressed, "It's entirely possible."

"Why bother?" the Director countered. "Why not just crash the plane in the remote jungle and get rid of the pair of them? Cortez already tried to kill them once. The less support for Ms Croft, the easier Cortez' job becomes. He eventually wears her down until she's in ruins, then she's got no other option but to break off and leave him to it."

Agent David fixed the Director with a razor sharp stare. "No way," he drilled back. "Lara Croft would certainly die before letting the likes of Cortez beat her down into submission. Its more likely Cortez has realized this and changed tack, and now wants to use his hostages as bargaining chips to get Lara to cooperate."

"Will she?"

David pondered a moment, leaning back in the deck chair as he thought. "Lara isn't a cold-blooded killer," he assured at pensive length. "But pushed against the wall like this… " - he again mulled over the thought awhile - "she's not the same person she was just two years ago. Her character has changed. I can't say for sure."

A wolfish still silence descended over the Director. His mind clearly working through several clandestine scenarios to their bitter ends, his veteran's brow knitted in long-experienced thought. Just what God's name was a bitter and twisted, yet deviously, and evilly clever man like Cortez capable of scheming?

"Cortez though," the Director then began slowly – amid drawn out puffs of Cuban tobacco smoke, "mustn't think he can find what he's looking for without Ms Croft's help. Else why is he crapping around with hostages? Why not just bump her off if she shows up in the wrong place – he's got the hitmen to do it? No – there's more to it – even old-man-Thonapa has hit a wall on this one. They've both admitted this thing is beyond them, so they've turned to the only other expert in the field." He chuckled then, with an extra thought he found amusing. "Too bad she's a loose cannon, they're both going to need to be careful they don't piss her off."

"So they both need Lara to ply her unique gift through any trapped, and murdering ruins they might find along the way?" David offered.

The director stabbed the smoking Cuban directly toward David's calculating eyeballs. "Exactly! She's the only one who can traverse a deathtrap and live to tell the tale, and both of them know it!"

"Still," David persisted, somewhat unconvinced. "I can't help but think the hostages are a backup plan, _in case_ Lara turns up unexpectedly and begins gunning down Cortez' expensive thugs." He massaged his five-o'clock-shadow jawline and let his eyes focus on the circled B-17 in the satellite images. "If I was him, I'd get rid of Lara Croft the first chance I got. Clearly, whatever Cortez stole from Lara's mansion has lit a fire, and given him the confidence to surge ahead and attempt to find the lost Inca artefacts under his own steam."

The Director's gaze narrowed, his shrewd mind taking a hold of the theory. "So," he summed, nodding, "if Cortez can bring Lara Croft under his thumb, he uses her – and her considerable skills – to help locate the Inca artefacts." David simply nodded. "If," the Director continued, "Lara Croft makes the proverbial hit the fan, Cortez raises enough hell to send her spiralling down to the underworld, and then solves his problems with brute force." Another contemplative drag on the Cuban ensued, thoughts clearly still forming. David simply waited. "Trouble is," the Director continued after a moment, "those Inca were crafty, _damn_ crafty. If Cortez sends Lara to hell, then marches in – wherever – with a truckload of dynamite, he's liable to active some sort of contingency plan the Inca devised in case things went pear shaped, and bring the whole house crashing down."

It was again David's turn to nod with agreement, arms crossed, and chin cradled in his left hand as he thought. "The objects those ancient Inca scholars created scared them enough to make them move heaven and earth to get them as far away from evil hands as possible. You can bet whatever you like they'd have gone to extraordinary lengths to make sure some bulldozing fool didn't stumble across them. Whoever gets there first will have to do _exactly_ what's required to get anywhere near the hoard. Otherwise the whole lot will be destroyed, along with whoever might happen to be nearby."

The Director nodded grimly. "That's how I'd have set things up, were it me stashing dangerous artefacts away like that. Makes perfect sense, if someone makes a wrong move while trying to get to the goods – boom! Nobody gets anything, and the world is safe." Again the Cuban stabbed the air to emphasise the point, a trail of smoke following haphazardly immediately in its wake.

A short silence followed as each man pondered the portents of the various likely scenarios.

"Destroying the artefacts could very well be the best option, if there's even the smallest danger Cortez might get his hands on them," David warned, with a set expression chiselled across his rugged features.

"We'll cross that bridge _if_ and when we come to it. For now, our priority _has_ to be to keep Ms Croft in business. While she's _in_ business we have a hope of cutting Cortez from the deal, the second she's out, _we_ beat Cortez to the chequered flag with a truck load of our own dynamite." The Director had made the call, and that's the way it would be. David knew it was the only real option, and had no argument, having arrived at mostly the same conclusions earlier in the evening.

David had worked for Office 43 since its inception in 1982, and although David deferred to the Director, both men knew damn well what the score was, and both men knew the way the other thought. Theirs was a friendship stretching far back beyond the creation of Office 43, and often, little needed saying to ensure both agreed on a course of action. Each shared a deep respect and understanding for the other, borne of many years working together, to the point where other Office 43 agents often joked the pair had a permanent telepathic link established connecting their thoughts. David looked at the hospital drip, feeding into the Director's arm.

"What's with the Drip?" he ventured. "Did you forget your vitamin pills?"

The Director waved his smoking Cuban dismissively. "Cancer. Doc says I've got a couple of months." The answer came calmly, as if he were describing a stack of bothersome paperwork.

David froze. "Cancer?" He was stuck for words a moment, before softly blurting out, "Jesus Christ!"

"Forget it David. We've both known for some time I was coming to the end of the line."

"True, but Goddamn cancer?" David put his head in both hands, staring back at his long-time friend. "Damn!"

A sparkle glinted though the director's pasty green eyes as he regarded his dumbstruck, long-time friend and best agent with a sly grin. "I'm not out of the game quite yet old friend. Relieving the world of William Cortez will be my final act. No way I'm slipping away quietly until that son-of-a-bitch is pushing up a bunch of nancy-pink roses!" The Cuban skewered the air like a flaming arrow. "That, I promise you!"

David glanced across at a beaten gunmetal-grey double-door cabinet. He knew its appearance was deceptive; a casual observer could easily dismiss it as being filled with dusty paperwork, or nefarious tools of the trade. Instead, it held a variety of expensive liquor that rarely saw the light of day, very few Office 43 employees even knowing of its existence. It was kept in reserve for those few times when a drink was truly called for. Without a shred of a doubt, David knew that this was such a time.

Wordlessly, David rose and headed straight for the cabinet, the Director offering no complaint. For the most part, Office 43 employees who were on the job, strictly kept alcohol to a minimum, but even the Director knew that life often threw up challenges that needed a little mellowing time to work through.

David clinked a handful of ice cubes in a glass tumbler, and then trickled a healthy dose of Bombay Gin over the top for himself. For the Director, a finger of single malt Bruichladdich 20-year-old whiskey, straight. "What do you make of Malcolm Cullen?" he asked while busy with the task. "Quite a fight he put up against that mark one of Cortez'. It's a miracle he's still damn-well alive."

"Nah," the Director replied. "I pulled his file."

"And?"

"Tough son-of-a-bitch. British Special Forces, had a reputation for endurance - and rushing headlong into fights that others seemed less than ecstatic about."

"He obviously lived to tell the tale?" David stated.

"Came walking out of the desert two weeks after a raid on a military camp near Al Bussayyah; he was the only survivor of a ten man team. Seems like the top brass made some bad judgement calls on intel they'd received, meaning Cullen and his team walked straight into a hornet's nest there, and got seven shades of Hell blasted out of them."

David returned to the desk and handed over the whisky glass. "Any idea how he survived?"

"Not a shred," The Director shrugged as he took the glass with a nod of thanks. "He was pretty beat up, and spent the next month and a half in a military hospital camp in Umm Qasr. After that, the file was noticeably edited, a cover-up for sure."

"Somebody high up was made to look bad," David guessed.

The Director gave the Bruichladdich a savouring sip and nodded in agreement. "That's how I read it."

"He may well come in handy then," David figured. "Ex Special Forces. Looks like the late Amelia Croft did her homework when she chose her Security outfit."

David had liked Malcolm Cullen almost instantly. Although moving on from middle age, he still appeared to have a mental, and physical toughness that was somewhat rare within the majority of over-comfortable modern society. Only the most hardened and driven man would actually _choose_ to pick a fight with an over-strengthened madman. Added to that, Cullen took nothing for granted; he still didn't trust David fully, even after they'd arrived back at the Foxhound HQ.

Another cloud of quality Cuban smoke drifted in spirited eddies toward the ceiling and pooled there, the Director's mind forever flexing across several thoughts at once. "Stanley Forde is no fool either," he added. "Cullen had him trained by the best in the business, as well as revealing a few secrets himself. Agent Lafayette thinks him bordering on Special Forces ability. Only thing missing is real life action experience."

"Lafayette is a good judge if anyone is," David replied, sipping from his now frosted tumbler. "Seheira Sahain is as good as dead if he didn't make it. She'll never get out alive."

The Director considered the statement. "Don't underestimate her too quickly David," he said, once his thoughts had melded. "Ms Sahain is not stupid – you already found that out at your first meeting – though the both of us already knew it." He gave David a pointed look. "She's a gifted clinical psychologist – I hacked the database at Oxford – seems some heavyweights in the field have only good things to say about her."

"Not exactly ugly either," David added.

"No," The Director concurred. "Being as smart as she is, she'll use that to her advantage – just like Lara Croft does. As we both know, some of the most dangerous operatives on the planet were, and are, beautiful women. Her achilles heel though, is her naivety when it comes to cold, calculating evil."

"If Cortez has his way with her?" David seemed to lose a shade or two of colour with the thought. But the Director had no questions.

"We take her out," he said almost immediately. "I'm not letting that psychotic hellspawn torture her for the rest of her life. God help me, but I'll pull the damn trigger myself." The Director was nothing short of adamant, his eyes flint hard.

"Tough call," David replied. "Lara's friends are thin on the ground at the moment; Amanda's disappearance, Zip's Disappearance, Alister Fletcher's death, old Winston in hospital – all on top of her mother and father. She's falling apart."

"That whole Natla affair was bizarre to say the least," The Director added in reply. "And that's saying something considering the circles _we_ move within." He then seemed to gaze up at a point on the ceiling, but his minds-eye clearly elsewhere. "I'm not pulling the goddamn trigger on anyone David – not until we're nothing but shadows and dust ourselves. The world needs Lara Croft more than the goddamn-hell they realise, and it's up to us to make sure she damn well doesn't go off the deep end before her time."

David swilled chilled Bombay gin around his mouth, savouring the sensation, before swallowing. "While you and me still breathe, old compadre, it's not going to happen."

"Amen to that," The Director replied, holding up his own glass in salute.

David knew that Lara Croft held the key to a great many things the world at large knew next to nothing about, or didn't care a single jot for. _The world is naïve_, he thought somewhat dejectedly to himself. Too few people knew what Lara Croft knew, and, outside the walls of Office 43, most were evil sons-of-bitches. It was testimony to Lara's strength of character, and the Croft lineage, that she was not interested in using her discoveries to gain some sort of power, or position for herself. Most work-a-day folk would think her mad, or even have a screw loose, should they ask for a truthful recount of Lara's strangest day in memory. Even a run-of-the-mill day would raise more than a few questioning eyebrows. Her world though, was cracking at the seams, and her life slowly but surely coming apart. A lot, it seemed to David, had gone up in smoke with the Croft mansion in Surrey when it burned, the flames taking more than just bricks and mortar with them into the sky.

The media cover-up, orchestrated by Office 43, had been designed to keep the wolves from her door. Courtesy of an insatiable grapevine, the attack on the Croft Mansion near Oxford had reached the local newspapers within a day. Early morning bike-riders had also reported on a popular Oxford social networking site the fact that they'd seen some sort of attack helicopter in the area that morning. Winston in hospital, Foxhound blown to smithereens… It was only a matter of time before the media hounds smelled something on the boil, and came running like a pack of bloodthirsty wolves. David had seen it all-too-many-times before.

William Cortez, David knew, was an evil, and fatally intelligent man. Lara Croft's downfall would make the job of Office 43, to rid the world of unknown, and oftentimes mystical threats on humanity, almost impossible where Cortez was concerned. Lara Croft had a rare gift, a seemingly boundless analytical mind, which seemed to cut through haze and create solid leads from the thinnest shreds of barely-faint information. He'd love to put her through an Office 43 IQ test. The results of which, he was almost certain, would be very interesting indeed.

A soft chime sounded from somewhere up on the ceiling, amid an array of electronic wizardry. It was Vera's 'doorknock' as it were; the signal that she needed the Director's attention.

"Damn hologram," the Director growled under his breath. "What is it Vera?" he said more loudly, to nowhere in particular. It was no secret amongst the Office 43 corridors that the Director had little time for the upstart computer-come-humanoid. Not a day passed when somebody wouldn't overhear his grumblings about 'that goddamn stack of hard-drives' or 'that preening see-through nancy-girl'. Even he was forced to admit however, that Vera represented the absolute cutting edge of modern technology, her instant call on vast databases of information unrivalled the world over. It was a love hate relationship.

"Sir," Vera's seductive voice replied, also seemingly from nowhere, "I have some administrative tasks to perform. May I enter?"

"You can enter the damn vault and stay there!" This also under his breath, before, "Whatever you like," was delivered gruffly so she could hear.

Vera's ghostly apparition appeared immediately beside the Directors desk, her lithe feminine curves taking a few seconds to come more sharply into focus. David noted with some surprise, and amusement, that she still appeared in her grass skirt and bikini top. Big mistake.

The Director's mood darkened instantly. "Was there a slacker's goddamn free nancy-boy dress day that I didn't know about?" he said to her cuttingly, as he noted her inappropriate attire.

"Ohh cra –," she went rigid, and looked down at herself, without finishing the profanity.

Vera immediately blurred, as if she'd suddenly become a swarming cloud of lantern flies. When she focussed again, she was wearing a back business suit, with her blonde hair neatly tied back in a ponytail, and sporting business-style secretary reading glasses. Although, her business-skirt was dangerously risqué for such an office, being just a little too short for a formal outfit.

David imperceptibly shook his head and smiled. The techs were pushing it.

"I'm sorry about that sir," Vera replied. "It won't happen again." She looked genuinely apologetic.

The director glowered. "You got that right _sister!_ And tell your pals down in Tech Operations that if they pull a stunt like that again they'll be cleaning toilets in the mental ward before they can say 'stupid dickwad'!"

Vera said nothing, chastened, and looked across to David for support. But all he could do was produce an entirely false look of sympathy. Everybody knew what the Director was like, even the programmers down in Tech Operations.

"What's so important Vera?" David asked to smooth things over.

"You're due for a name change agent David," she said with a secretively coy smile. "You've been using 'David' for the allowed three months now."

"No kidding? Any suggestions on a replacement then?"

"As you know, you can't have a name you've already used, and certainly not your _real_ name. So your options are Alex, Vesna, Chipotle, Sanguinista, George, Tralfaz, Mulberry – "

"Alex will do fine," David quickly cut in, before the choices became too much more ridiculous, and the Director's mood went from bad to black. Clearly, 'Alex' was what he was supposed to choose, but wondered idly the consequences of his choosing 'Mulberry' as a name.

"Agent Alex you are from this point forward," the Director confirmed, looking him in the eye to say it was so. "Set it up Vera, and lose the _bullshit_ next time. That all?" He cocked a you-better-hope-so eye in her direction.

"No sir," she replied smartly. "Our satellites have tracked several attack helicopters converging on a point in the Anchotuma Valley in Bolivia. Eurocopters by the look of them, the same type as the one Cortez' henchmen used to escape England after the Croft Manor break in."

"The hell you say!"

Alex and the Director both had the same thought. _They'd found Lara Croft_.

"You think he's found her?" Alex asked, referring to Cortez and Lara Croft.

"It's gotta be." The Director replied, his piercing eyes seeming to bore through the brick wall as he pondered.

"Question is," Alex asked, "do we go after Lara Croft or Seheira Sahain?"

"We go charging in like bulls at a gate and damned Cortez'll know. He's got an armada of satellites just like we do."

"So we go in undercover." Alex knew the way he thought.

"Right," the Director agreed. "We don't need Cortez suspecting there's another party involved. Not just yet in any case."

"So Lara's a difficult prospect where she is right now."

"Damnedly – yes," the Director sighed, "But there must be some sort of base or hide-out near where the B-17 went missing," he theorized.

"Unless it really did crash."

"I don't think so."

"Neither do I," Alex said, his thoughts already lost in the Amazon jungle.

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**Now. Write that review you're thinking about right now. You know you want to!**

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	13. The Path of Chains Part I

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**Right! Okaaaaaaaaay! Here we go again.**

**Oh my freaking god! This chapter took longer than I *really* thought it would! No really!**

**See - the thing is - I had this idea of where I wanted the chapter to go, and what the clandestine-heck I wanted to put in it. So I go and write it - and write it - and write it... And all this cool stuff pops into my head and I'm like. No Way! I just gotta do that! Yahhhh! If I don't have *this* happen I'm going to run down the street screaming like a madman! So like, the people in my street are soo used to having a naked guy run screaming past their house in the middle of the night it isn't funny. "Oh Him! Nahhhhh he's mad! Harmless... but freaking off the planet!"**

**This chapter ended up at 12,000 words. Wait! Just a minute! I didn't post all 12,000 right here, because I *know* that's just too long for a FFnet chapter. ARRGHHHH! A long chapter! Quick... get a baseball bat! KILL IT! Arrghhh it's fighting back! DIE DIE DIE!**

**So The Path of Chains will be in three parts. It's all written, so the next two parts won't be too far away. Just a bit of editing, other faffing about, and I'll post those up too. Geez - I have a penchant for faffing around! You guys should try it sometime!**

**This first installment isn't so long. 3,500 words or so. Sound doable for you all? Right on compadre's! See how I look after you all!**

**As usual you can leave a review. In fact - you will grow Devil horns and begin to eat grass if you don't... Okay nobody is going to believe that. But *please* tell me what you think. Your Kama will increase significantly for the better if you do!**

**And look at that. Another rant filled with mindless dribble.**

**Oh... just start reading already!**

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**The Path of Chains**

Part One

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**Below the rain forests of Bolivia.**

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Lara Croft's mind reeled. Even for her, what her eyes now beheld took the cake in a way that beggared belief. Never before had she descended for hours deep into the earth, on a maddening journey through a series of clandestine traps, only to find a doorway hidden amid the darkness with her own name written all over it. _Something_, she thought vexatiously to herself, was definitely wrong with this whole debacle. She had a mind to simply turn on her heels and head for the surface for a breath of clean crisp air and a dip in a sunlit river pool. Hopefully then, sanity would return.

The carved, mystic vine surrounding the doorway seemed uncannily alive, as if planted there long ago by the hands of God, or some other powerful deity with the ability to shape and breathe life into solid stone or crystal. Faintly, softly, the blue crystal within the black basalt stone seemed to wax and wane with an irregular rhythm, as though a hidden intelligence toyed with a fader switch off through the damp darkness of the cavern. The effect, to Lara's disbelieving eyes, was to make it appear as if the leaves and flowers twisting out from the vine quavered in a gentle breeze. Her mind told her it could not be so, yet, her rapt appreciation of the skill required to produce such work had her lost within its impressively gentle embrace, just for a moment.

Slowly, her focus shifted to the glowing Celtic-style scrollwork.

"Lara," Tezra suddenly cut across her thoughts. "I know this is a little hard to – "

"Shhh!" Her reaction was immediate, and cut his words to silence. Her mind was entrained, and his voice, for the moment, was unwelcome.

Tezra's eyes glinted with understanding, and he silenced himself to wait, having garnered the hard way when Lara was not to be disturbed.

The interwoven snakes that Lara had been seeing ever since she'd dropped below the surface were once again in evidence. Their bodies appeared to writhe and pulse to the whims of the soft blue inner light the entwined crystal contained, which again seemed to give them a natural life of their own. With some, reptilian eyes glowed as if spirits from the afterlife had inhabited their stone bodies. Still others featured shining scaly bodies, carved with such a high level of detail and precision as to suggest a real life specimen had been frozen in time, and then infused with fine-grained black basalt stone.

The same black stone had been used in the construction of the door itself, but it had been polished to a high, almost mirror-like finish. Upon first inspection, the door appeared flat and featureless, the high polish doing an expert job reflecting the starfield-like cavern opposite, effectively hiding any detail that may lie beneath. Lara was intrigued.

She unclipped her LED Lenser torch from its mounting on her backpack shoulder strap, and, flicking on its beam, carefully studied the surface of the door. After mere moments, her intuition had paid dividends.

Caught in the light of Lara's beam, was a precision-crafted black-metal plate, placed almost dead centre on the stone door. Cut and faceted crystals, these ones unlit, were spaced around the plate at even intervals; they hinted their blue colour with subtly refracted light as Lara gently shifted her torch beam across the intriguingly constructed feature. She moved closer, staring intently, as an additional detail caught her eye in the ever-shifting light.

"I'll be damned," she breathed in a low whisper.

"You stole my line," Tezra ventured softly from the side. "Found something interesting?"

Lara gently flicked the black plate at its very edge, testing her assumption that it had been constructed out of a metal of some sort. A dull metallic tinging resulted, and she delicately nodded with a soft "mm-hmm" to herself in affirmation. Metal it was. Then she replied, "There's a handprint embedded in this metal plate - a doorknob of sorts if I were pushed on the subject."

"A trap?" asked Tezra.

"No." The reply came like a distraction, understated, but with clear assurety. Lara slowly reached out to place her hand over the imprint.

"Wait!" Tezra almost yelled at her in a harsh whisper. "It's too obvious – I mean – isn't it? I mean – for Gods sake Lara!"

The fox flashed an appearance as Lara glanced toward him with slinkily feline eyes. "Oh ye of little faith," she replied, a slight smile spreading across her lips. Lara's hand fit the imprint in the metallic plate perfectly, which, somehow, she knew it would.

Tezra suddenly wished he were anywhere but alongside this mad and mysterious woman. "Heavenly Gods above," he almost whined, coarse tension spearing through his vocal cords. "I hope you know what the _hell_ you're do– "

A sudden electric hum made Tezra's words die in his mouth. A blue-crystal spiderweb suddenly lit with brilliant blue fire with Lara's touch, and flowered out across the door from the metallic plate to the very edges of the ominous-looking black-stone portal, as if depicting the suns rays radiating out into space from the surface of the great fireball itself. The hiss of pent up steam pressure, or something very similar, then followed as the cut crystals surrounding the metallic plate began to pulse rhythmically in brilliant blue.

Lara removed her hand and stepped back, highly intrigued.

Not so Tezra. Intrigue was not the feeling flowing through his veins. He looked upon the sudden display with a none-too-confident, yet gamely steadfast expression; he _had_ to be here, but passionately wished he wasn't.

The humming changed pitch to that of a deeply voiced electric demon, and the ominous pressure-fed hissing rose to a crescendo of angered storm-driven cacophony. Then, amid a backwash of billowing steam, the door suddenly split in half with a solid thud, a clean, arrow straight line appearing dead centre from top to bottom, before the two halves slowly parted amid further clouds of jettisoned white mist. Upon reaching full travel, the sliding door halves halted and vented yet another release of seemingly endless steam pressure, enveloping Lara's foxlike gaze, and Tezra's transfixed semi-horror in an energetic white cloud.

The open doorway then appeared done, quieting to a state of gently escaping mist that seemed lit blue from within by the glowing crystal wrought through the stone in its midst. Lara slowly stepped forward, shining the beam of her torch into the newly revealed passageway.

"Correct me if I'm wrong," she said with intrigued amusement, "but _that_ little display seems to make a number of history books about steam technology a touch inaccurate. Wouldn't you say?" She casually flicked the torch over the escaping mist vents with interest as she moved into the open doorway and halted.

Strangely, a quiet calm had now come over Tezra Tekkara. "This is just the beginning Lara," he said with an almost stony voice. "History as you know it will be forever different from this day forward." He then motioned genteel-like into the dark passageway. "After you, Ms Croft."

Lara nodded. "If you insist," she replied with a casual air. But Tezra's sudden change in demeanour had caused a warning to weave through her crystalline thoughts. She expertly, yet ever so smoothly, checked that her left-hand Heckler & Koch moved freely in its holster – the one Tezra couldn't see.

The first footfall into the dark void set off a chain reaction that neither experienced adventurer, nor mysterious Incan descendent could ever have predicted in their wildest dreams. Blue light brilliance suddenly lit a passageway that stretched out before them seemingly at great length, disappearing only into the deep infinity of distance. Soccer ball sized crystal globes fired into life atop black basalt pedestals, the light within them appearing to flicker and writhe as if blue flames had somehow been manifested within. As they entered and made progress in hushed wonderment, it soon also became apparent to Lara that, within the perfectly smooth and parabolic walls of the passageway, the dendritic spiderweb of intruded blue crystal was illuminating only in a small radius around them, moving as they moved.

It was a sight that appeared ancient to Lara's eyes, yet, in complete paradox, highly advanced at the same time. "It appears there's a lot more going on here than meets the eye," she said, as she studied a section of wall immediately nearby with her torch. She then half turned, twisting at the hips, to regard Tezra who was standing a short distance behind her. "Isn't there?" she finished. It was a loaded question, Lara's intention at this stage simply being to ferret out which way he would bite.

"This technology is but a shadow of what the ancient scholars knew Ms Croft," Tezra replied, almost deadpan cold. "You of all people should not be surprised that knowledge once known, can be lost within the mists of time."

"I told you to call me Lara. Remember?"

His eye's narrowed ever so slightly, but the remainder of his expression lay expertly frozen. "If you insist - Lara Croft," he replied with his suddenly-cold demeanour.

Lara knew then, without a shadow of a doubt, the game had changed. Her feminine instinct slammed additional warning across her inner thoughts, her innate sense of self-preservation also moving to the fore to heighten her perceptive mind. _What the hell had changed, _she wondered. The game certainly _wasn't_ over yet. Or, did he know something she didn't?

The comfortable weight of her Heckler & Koch pistols again drew a small portion of her attention. Within less than a second, either one could be jammed inside a millimetre from the man's plotting eyeballs; a portion of her almost wishing it could be so. She worked alone. She explored alone, thought alone, discovered alone, and most of all, was rarely in the mood to be played like a puppet.

Lara took the lead, Tezra clearly waiting for her to do just that. The flickering-blue crystal globes ran along each side of the passageway, the animated light proving a distraction to begin with, until Lara schooled her vision enough to filter away their illumination flux, and focus more solidly on the detail of their surroundings. She felt like a trap sniffer-dog in service to the man behind her. _Fine,_ she thought. _But this little dog had pretty sharp teeth._

They worked their way through the mesmeric passageway for no more than fifteen minutes. The absence of any 'blundering fool' devices left Lara icily on edge, having almost fully expected to come across a trap of some divine making or other. Their non-appearance, to her way of thinking, was almost certainly part of some grand design, a calm before the storm.

They came upon a staircase leading a short way up to another barred doorway, appearing twin to the one that had granted them access to the passageway. Lara took her time to ascend the stairs; her intense gaze following each glowing line of glowing crystal as it flowed through the black stone, her hearing schooled and singly focussed on any sound that could not be explained. Her open palm hands poised delicately at her sides.

Tezra followed, silently, seemingly more adept than before. _Interesting._

The door operated as the first had done, Lara's open-handed touch to the black metal plate producing a similar orchestration of electric humming and thick billowing steam as before.

Lara raked her outstretched door hand fingertips through her still gritty tied back hair, and peered through the misty gloom to the space beyond.

A feeling…

She peered, silently statuesque.

Slowly, both hands sunk to hover over the grips of her Heckler & Koch pistols.

Her breathing stilled to barely there. Her eyes bored through the glowing swirling mist.

"What – " Tezra started.

"Shh Shh!" The double admonishment came rapid fire.

A tense moment passed in pent-up silence, Lara every bit the stalking huntress.

The barest sliver in time was all it took for both Lara's pistols to become drawn and unleash hell into the mist, their custom gunpowdered rounds flashing ahead in the semi-dark amid their loud cracking rapport.

"Get down!" Lara yelled as she danced aside with a panther's grace.

The warning had barely left her hunter's lips, when the strangest machination on the planet barrelled through the doorway on highly engineered wings of only God knew what, a swirling misted vortex following in its wake as it burst through the remaining steam trailing off the doorway. Loud demonic humming, combined with the sounds of gunfire on steroids, followed the thing as it peppered the ground and walls around it with a deathly destructive and glowing blue fusillade of clandestine attack. Everywhere a glowing round hit, moments later exploded with a small blue puff of additional energy. It was enough to crater the stone and fill the air with subterranean shrapnel.

Lara dropped down on one knee and followed the flightpath of – the thing – with a merciless attack of her own, each pistol firing a deathly rapid string of 9mm slugs, each bullet-flash reflecting in her angry eyes.

Her left-hand gun ran dry. The other, Lara knew, was two rounds away from a similar fate.

The flying object arced out into the passageway and hovered erratically, weather from her attack or being just the way it operated, Lara couldn't know. It's attack ceased, and a blue laserbeam appeared and began scanning the surrounds, sending fluorescent-blue lines slowly moving across the surfaces near it. Lara had no doubt it was searching out a new target.

Smoothly, silently, Lara reached to her belt for another two ammunition clips of over-primed rounds, these particular clips holding the highest gunpowder content she dared. Removing the empties, she tossed them to Tezra, who was crouching down across from her on the other side of the doorway. She held her right hand gunbarrel to her lips, signalling to him that she wanted silence, her malachite-green eyes nothing short of commanding.

Tezra nodded coldly efficient. He understood, for now.

The mechanical device hummed and hovered, seemingly still having some difficulty. Slowly it began to pivot in-situ, its scanning lasers slowly moving around toward them in their hunt for prey. Lara's quick assessment of the unexplainable device's firepower left her in no doubt of the result should its attack meet human flesh.

Lara's eyes never wandered off her target as her well-practiced hands slotted home the turbo-primed replacement clips.

Her eyes hardened.

The laser fell across Lara's twin gunbarrels as she unleashed her second tirade of Lara Croft hell. The recoil of the supercharged rounds gave her nothing but satisfied pleasure, and the extra-loud crackling rapport as each round came to life rang luxuriously in each of her waiting eardrums.

The machine, appearing like a short and stumpy dragonfly, unleashed a brief burst of its blue crystal fire, before one of its mechanical dragonfly wings was blown clean off by a well aimed shot sequence from Lara's guns. Instantly it lost stability in the air, and spun rapidly side-over-side as it quickly plummeted to the stone floor and flew apart amid a display of mini lightning and a large blue puff reminiscent of its own firepower. Then it lay silent.

Lara kept both guns trained on it, should it decide to spring back to life. Her adrenalin pumped, and she slowly stood. "That was interesting," she said, in a wholly understated manner.

Tezra got to his feet also, brushing himself off as he rose. "A small display of the technology that lies in wait Lara," he said, with shrewd calculation in his voice. He nodded at Lara's pistols. "You're good with those."

Lara put the barrel of her right hand gun near her nose so she could smell the aroma of the spent gunpowder. "I love the smell of gunpowder in the morning," she said foxily. "If I had it my way," she added luxuriously, as she slid both guns home into their holsters, "I'd have gunpowder for breakfast. Gunpowder on toast, mmmm mmm. Don't knock it till you try it." She then smiled a slight smile, knowing full well what she'd said was ridiculous. It served to keep Tezra guessing, which was exactly the way she wanted it.

"_You_, Ms Croft," he replied, seemingly nonplussed, "are mad. What happens when your guns go missing?"

"Then I find the nearest big stick and get busy with that."

"Are you any good with big sticks?"

"Better than most," Lara replied airily, as she turned to look through the doorway. She knew that Tezra was attempting to seed doubt in her mind, doubt about her own abilities, and doubt that she could ever be in control. Unfortunately for him however, Lara was no stranger to such conniving attacks.

With an afterthought, Lara cautiously turned walked over to where the odd dragonfly had fallen, and began studying its construction. It was definitely metallic, being predominantly fabricated from the night-black metal she'd been coming across for some time now. She reached down and tinged the barrel of her right hand pistol against the midsection of the dragonfly's body to make sure. She turned back to Tezra.

"Any idea what this black metal is?" she asked.

"We call it 'Lithillium'," he replied through guarded undertones. "But don't go looking for it on any chart of the elements, it's extremely rare. If fact, so far as we can tell, only the ancient Guild of Scholars at Cuzco knew of its existence, and its true capabilities."

Lara's interest piqued. "True capabilities?"

Tezra nodded surreptitiously and moved up beside her, and also regarded the odd looking beast. "Mostly," he began, " Lithillium is quite benign. But the ancient Inca –Scholar Capac in particular – found a way to combine it with gold, and the blue crystal that's a little hard to miss in this cavern. The result was an uncanny mix of energy sources and devices of any function you could imagine. It seems, depending on exactly how the three elements are mixed, you can end up with a vastly different array of properties and outcomes."

"I take it the blue crystal is also rare?" Lara asked.

"Extremely," Tezra replied. "To date, we know of no other source. This is the first time I've ever seen it in-situ. Thonapa has never revealed if he knows of another source. Some secrets, for reasons known only to him, he keeps to himself."

Lara deflected the conversation away from the obvious displeasure Tezra showed about being kept in the dark over Thonapa's secrets. "How powerful could this Lithillium be?" Lara queried. "Could it provide energy for an entire city?"

"Oh yes," Tezra replied casually without hesitation. "Without a doubt. The person who controlled the world's resources of Lithillium and the blue crystal could indeed power entire cities quite easily. The problem would be finding enough of each to do so. The combinations also often require the addition of sunlight upon the blue crystals to operate."

Lara gave the dragonfly a thoughtful tap with her boot. "It could be used to make powerful weapons too it seems," she said.

Tezra deflected the sobering thought, as if not wanting to acknowledge the fact. "It could be used to make anything Lara," he replied. "Anything at all."

Lara tingled with the implications of what Tezra had revealed, and his ambiguity of character. She sensed, rather than saw the evidence, that it was time to end the conversation. The Lithillium was a double-edged sword, able to do immense good, but also able to do extreme evil in the wrong hands. It was no wonder, she thought, that the Inca scholars had gone to such lengths to hide their discoveries from the world, no doubt believing it wasn't yet ready for what they had learned. She sighed with the thought, and turned back to continue her survey of the room beyond the doorway.

Lara suddenly frowned as she caught the outlines of a very familiar object through the venting steam. "What the?" she breathed, as pure disbelieving recognition struck.

Tezra suddenly fixed her with a driving stare. "Another mechanical insect?" he queried.

"No," Lara replied, with a slight shake of her head. "It's my old four poster bed."


	14. The Path of Chains Part II

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**Well... *polish glasses* I wrote this little update last night. Yeah I just tapped it out without a fuss... all pretty simple and easy really. *Yawn* **

**Okay so that is the biggest lie on the planet. This took me weeks to write and get to a point where I more or less liked it. Yeah... not bad I suppose... :) I have this thing where I'm my own worst critic...**

**Hopefully when you read this you won't begin to glow in the dark... Ok I said that to get everybody intrigued & interested. **

**"What? Why am I gonna glow in the dark if I read this story?... Ok we'll soon see about that absurd claim... Stupid fool..." **

**Ok so I see that a small and modest number of people seem to be reading Journey. Kudos to you if you are reading it, you are destined to do well in life. :) Soon you'll begin to find things going your way... that pay rise you wanted... that buffoon next door getting his comeuppance, and that annoying slash-band drummer down the street mysteriously 'losing' his drum sticks...**

**Ok so that might be pushing the boundary of reality a shade but heck... Do I make the rules?**

**Now - ffnet has this amazing functionality that allows you rant about my story. Tell me to shut up... or... "Ohhhhh I loved that" (my favorite) or "OMG I can't believe that 'X' shot 'Y' and danced on his grave to a Britney Spears tune". Even "Oooer I felt god-awful after reading that - in a good way" and "Oh! Ooh! aahhh! I nearly died, jumped in the pool, and pretended to shoot my neighbors with a mouldy bananna!"**

**Ok so that got ridiculous. Point being you can review my story and I'll appreciate every word you write.**

**Hope you enjoy Part II**

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**The Path of Chains**

Part Two

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Lara stood in the centre of her bedroom. Everything was exactly where it should have been. Each item, including the carved horse she'd only recently placed on her dresser, was where she herself had meticulously placed them over the years. The woven Balinese mat that had been by the door as long as she could remember, the Galileo thermometer by the window, the 1980's vintage alarm clock – a gift from her long-departed high school friend Seheira – which sat on her bedside table, and, a teenage photograph of herself galloping across the Croft Estate on her father's stallion. It was all there, every bit of it.

Except every single detail had been carved out of black basalt stone, and shot through with lines of glowing blue crystal. A steadily glowing blue crystal orb, the light of which appeared otherworldly and far-travelled from a long distant alien sun, had also replaced the chandelier on the ceiling. The windows were right where they were supposed to be, except the two dimensional view they framed was again crafted out of the now familiar glowing crystal lines. Her four-poster bed, a certifiable antique, looked suitably plush as Lara cast her incredulous eyes over it, yet she knew this particular version would be nothing short of granite-hard.

"Well," Lara began, as if not knowing exactly what words she should say. "Welcome to my bedroom – I suppose." The experience left her feeling surreal – lost inside a dream. "Usually I don't invite strangers into my bedroom, so consider yourself lucky."

"Usually?" the cool voice of Tezra queried.

"Touché," Lara replied provocatively, briefly turning to fix him with her best none-of-your-business face – which included a warning of don't-go-there-again, expressed within a deviously narrowed gaze.

Tezra was no longer the slightest bit interested in any case, having inexplicably crashed out of his earlier admiration for her. He shrugged, Lara was a beautiful woman yes, one to be admired even, but he preferred the more subservient type. Women who'd cook, clean, and serve him without question whenever he wanted were more to his exacting taste. Somehow, he just didn't think Lara would fit the bill; she was far too strong willed – and knew how to use a gun. He turned and gestured around himself with outstretched arms. "Now will you believe what I'm telling you?" he asked. "This room was chiselled from the rock hundreds of years in the past, yet, it's accurate down to the very way you left your own bedroom in England before coming here." He then rounded on her and pressed her directly with a pointed finger. "Isn't it?"

Again Lara's attention caught on the carved wooden horse sitting on her dressing table. "Yes, damn it!" she admitted. "But seeing into the future is pure science fiction!" The words came out, but, although she tried, Lara could form no better alternative explanation.

Tezra could see Lara's internal conflict written all over her face, the first, and the only time he would ever be able to do so. "You know I'm right," he pressed her still further. "Don't you?"

Lara said nothing, but rather gave him a sideways glance that revealed no more than her pensively working mind, her thoughts on the subject kept surreptitiously to herself. Eventually, after a few moments in contemplative silence, she changed the subject.

"Thonapa said I should find something here, stone bas-relief tablets of some sort. Care to explain?"

Annoyance flashed ever so briefly across Tezra's face with such a speed it would have been missed by most. Not Lara however, her tigress eyes caught the momentary lapse like the jaws slamming shut on a trap. Tezra took a slow gaze around Lara's copied room, clearly considering his next words carefully with deep thought.

"Only one other set of carvings has been discovered so far," he eventually revealed. "Thonapa discovered them beneath the ruins of Tiwanku in 1894. There were – "

"You said 1894," Lara butted in to correct him. "That means Thonapa would have to be around one hundred and twenty to one hundred and thirty years old. I'm sure he's not quite _that_ ancient is he?" She moved across to sit with feet crossed on her stone-copied bed.

Tezra looked at her in cold calculation. "Oh no Lara," he replied. "He's _much_ older than that."

Lara snorted a laugh of disbelief. "You're bluffing. Do you honestly expect me to believe that?"

"And should I believe that King Midas truly had the ability to turn any object he desired into gold?"

Lara carefully examined Tezra's expression. "What, pray tell, does the children's fairytale of King Midas have to do with anything?"

"Only the fact that it's the unbelievable truth," Tezra said evenly. "A fact that only you, and perhaps one, or maybe two other people at MI6 are privy to."

"You're lying," Lara riposted darkly.

"Am I?" Tezra snapped. "The truth is the truth Lara. Don't try to deny what you know simply because it suits you. You know the legend of King Midas is real, just like you know that what I'm telling you is the truth."

Lara's face took on the expression of a panther on the hunt. "What I know – is that you haven't been straight with me. What I know is that you'll never find the Lost Inca artefacts without my help in a thousand years. And what _I _know" – her mouth twisted up into a subtle smile – "is that you don't have the smallest iota of an idea where to even _begin_ looking for Scholar Capac's trail," her eyes blazed at him, "do you?"

A strange silence came over Tezra Tekkara. How in seven blue hells did she even know of scholar Lloque Capac's name, or even that he ever existed? The Scholar's name had been meticulously wiped from the face of the Earth; save for some very cleverly hidden clues that only the man himself had left behind. The fact that Lara knew the name, and hadn't chosen to reveal her knowledge until this very moment spoke volumes.

"It seems I've underestimated you Ms Croft," Tezra said stonily, studying Lara's reaction.

Lara's expression remained placid and foxy. "Did you think I'd reveal all my secrets just because you asked?"

Tezra shrugged, appearing nonchalant, but with a twist of annoyance. "All we know for sure is that Scholar Capac and a small number of followers escaped Cuzco in the dead of night just days before the Spanish Conquistadors arrived and ransacked the place, and enslaved the people. That was _all_ we knew, until Thonapa discovered a small chamber beneath the ruins of Tiwanku. Inside, he found twelve square bas relief tablets carved out of stone, about the size a small to medium painting would be." Tezra used pointed fingers to box out the approximate dimensions in the air in front of him. "From those, we know that Scholar Capac and his people fled to the banks of a mighty river, loaded their cargo aboard four sea-going reed ships, and vanished."

Lara nodded, as some pieces of the puzzle began falling into place. But she knew there had to be more. "So why didn't the stone carvings just tell Thonapa where to start looking? Why on Earth would any of this have anything to do with me?"

"Trust me," Tezra replied with an honest empty gesture. "We've simply got no idea ourselves. All we know is that you – or a woman strikingly similar in appearance to you – appears several times in Thonapa's carvings." Tezra began to pace back and forth. "Can I ask how you came to be on Scholar Capac's trail?"

This time Lara was forthcoming, seeing no point in holding back. "I found a map in King Midas' palace, in the form of a small stone pyramid."

"That led you here to the Anchotuma Valley?" asked Tezra.

"It did," Lara affirmed. "But it took several months to locate the small pyramid marker stones that were hidden in the jungle. Most were in pieces, but some remained intact."

"The marker stones then led you to the entrance to the underground river?" Tezra pressed.

"Right again," Lara said, nodding. "The rest you surely know, since you followed me all the way to the forest cave."

Tezra thought a moment, as if studying closely some detail down at floor level. "Cortez now has the pyramid map," he said after the pause, looking up at her. "That's why he raided your mansion."

"Then it's lucky I took some detailed photographs," Lara said, a slight crafty smirk appearing. "Isn't it?"

Tezra seemed troubled. "Do you – we – still need the map?" he asked. "Did it only show you the way here? Or is there more to it?"

"There's more to it," Lara said as she rose, stretched her athletic arms toward the stone ceiling, and made for her copied walk in robe. As she pondered exactly what other information to reveal, she absently wondered if the stone carvers of old had managed to make her a set of stone fashion items as well. Before she went inside, she turned back to regard her follower.

"The pyramid depicts either a series of locations, or the directions required to get from one location to the next. All are depicted in ancient Inca Glyphs. However," – she held up a lecturing finger – " portions of the glyphs are missing."

A look of dark suspicion crossed Tezra's features. "Missing?"

Lara's seductive smile twisted at the corners of her mouth. "Right. Scholar Capac didn't want to give over the whole map all at once, he was much too clever for that. What he did was simple, but extremely effective."

Lara went silent. She knew full well that only by arriving at the correct location could the completing glyph of any section of the map be discovered. Once a part was completed, in theory, the pyramid map would in one way or another point the way to the next location. That, also in theory, would eventually lead to Scholar Capac's and the otherworldly Inca artefacts' location. The exact key to the map however, was knowledge that Lara decided was for her alone. She suspected, almost with a cold certainty, that she would need at least _some_ aces up her sleeve to stay alive in what was to follow. Lara knew she was now deeply involved in a shadowy ring of intrigue and subterfuge, and would need plenty of wits about her to stay in the game.

Sensing he would get no more, Tezra again settled into a strange quiet, but added, "Cortez now knows exactly what we know, and he's an expert on all things Inca. Obsessed would be a better way of putting it. No doubt he cracked the code which lead here," he pointed to the ground, "and got mighty angry when he found your helicopter already on-site in that high resolution imagery Thonapa spoke of."

"So we find the next key to the puzzle somewhere in my carbon-copy room here," Lara said. "Then burn the evidence and make like we were never here."

Tezra checked his watch. "If we don't get a move on, we'll be chunky meat for Cortez God-forsaken hounds. His thugs would have to be close by now." With that, he squatted down to check under Lara's desk for anything unusual, and begin running his hands across the smooth stone flooring for some type of hidden mechanism.

But a second later, Lara found exactly what Thonapa had described. Stepping into her subterranean walk in robe, she found it was nothing of the sort. Instead, she found a small crystal-lit chamber whose walls were adorned with no less than eight carved stone bas-relief tablets. The chamber stone itself was black, but the tablets had been carved from a coffee-coloured stone that didn't seem similar to anything she'd seen since dropping into the subterranean river, which seemed like days ago to her now.

Lara's skin prickled. She could tell without a shadow of a doubt the tablets were old, their extreme age seeming to leap out at her as if through a sheer tidal wave of ancient presence. Each was extremely detailed, and all were carved with such an exact precision it was difficult to imagine what could possibly have been wrought to accomplish the feat. Lara turned on the spot in the centre of the chamber, her eyes silently scanning each carved scene through a veil of incredulous discovery. There was simply no way any of the tablets were coming with her, as every single one seemed cemented to the walls of the chamber, with no apparent method of quick removal in evidence.

A broken passenger plane sat amid the frosted peaks of desolate and remote mountains, one wing wrenched back to such an angle as to appear almost completely severed. The other was almost whole, except the tip had been violently torn off as if by force of dynamite. The sight of the aircraft threatened tears.

A stately mansion sat in the green rolling hills of the English countryside. A woman, regal in appearance, tended rows of rose bushes that almost seemed too real to be set in stone. The woman held a basket, in which sat blooms no doubt destined for brightening duties somewhere inside the residence. A man sat at a garden table nearby, he was dressed impeccably, and ensconced in a thick book of some description. A blanket covered a small portion of grass near to the man's feet, on which sat a young girl with long hair set in a ponytail; she also held a book in an almost perfect mimic to the way the man held his. Lara knew – remembered – exactly who the little girl was.

An athletic woman held a Heckler & Koch pistol to the temple of a man who looked as if he could have commanded the legions of the dead, such was the evil intent that spilled from his features like putrid water off a fetid rubbish tip. The woman's eye's burned with unforgiving hate, her workout strengthened arm around his neck in a headlock, and her right leg braced against a bookcase for additional leverage. An elderly man lay battered and bloody in the background, but with a look of stoic defiance toward the man within the woman's grip. Lara never did shoot the damned thug, though she knew he deserved it. He ended up with the French police if memory served. But after that, only God knew what happened to the vile scum. The elderly man, her good friend, _did_ survive the beating, but she'd only arrived in the nick of time to save his life. Oddly, the man now looked upon the event with a certain fondness, and remained Lara's staunch confidante to this very day.

Four sizable reed sailing craft sailed away from a large waterfall that appeared almost lost within the dark and dense forest that surrounded it. The large river seemed almost picturesque, except it was a battle scene. Flames engulfed the rearmost sailboat as men, some also burning, dived and jumped for their lives into the smooth waters of the river. On the riverbank, a battle weary man fought back several armoured enemy with a massive sword that seemed to exude some sort of power. His corded muscles and defiant stance spoke volumes of his unwillingness to accept death without a fight. An old man dressed in flowing robes stood atop the lead boat and surveyed the scene. In his hands he held a long device, looking almost certainly like a weapon of some sort. A young girl stood not far away from the man, she gripped the railing of the upper deck as if panic stricken.

Lara's eyes lingered on the battle scene a moment. A strange feeling came over her, as if the captured moment was somehow a window into far more than the event it portrayed.

Suddenly Tezra's voice rang out. "What's going on in there?" he asked. "Did you find something?"

Lara thought quickly, and immediately started pulling her hair out of the plaited braid she'd tied it into earlier. "Women's business!" she called back while busy with the task – she had no intention of letting Tezra see the carvings. Without a shadow of a doubt, they had indeed been carved for her, and her alone. The how and why, although deeply perplexing, was a question for another time.

Lara slipped the hair elastic band over her wrist, and then fluffed her lengthy dust-coated tresses out over her shoulders and down over her backpack. It would have to do. Tezra would no doubt be perplexed at the sudden need for her to change her hairstyle, but would hopefully put it down to the oddly weird antics of fashion-conscious women and the presence of a dressing room. The plan that actually dealt with keeping him out of the walk in robe, however, was still a work in progress.

Scholar Capac, or whoever had carved the tablets, had somehow seemed to know of her predicament, because sitting on the wall at the rear of the chamber was a small instruction tablet. Intrigued, Lara stepped closer to the smaller carving and shook her head with admiring disbelief. The image of a modern digital camera had been carved into the ancient stone. She was supposed to photograph the tablets, not lug them out by hand.

_Smart thinking,_ she thought wryly.

Working quickly, Lara extracted her small waterproof camera from her backpack and immediately got busy photographing each of the carved tablets.

"Damn it Lara there's not a damn thing out here!" Tezra's echoing voice called from the carbon-copy bedroom. "What exactly does 'women's business' mean anyway? Don't tell me you're hiding something in there?"

_Damn the man!_

Lara needed something plausible. "It means I'm not decent you naïve pillock!" she called back, almost playfully affable. The last thing she needed was to make Tezra suspicious with a cutting tone, so she bought her play-acting skills to the fore once more.

The moment the words left her mouth, Lara feverishly continued her work with the camera.

Tezra seemed annoyed more than anything else, which was a good sign. "This is no time for a freshen-up Ms Croft! Clocks ticking!" he huffed loudly, making sure Lara could hear his displeasure. But importantly, he made no move to enter the chamber.

Lara briefly paused to roll her eyes toward the ceiling. '_Clocks ticking,'_ she mouthed silently to herself in contempt, her face pure mockery. "Your _ass_ will be ticking in a moment!" she added with annoyed, equally hushed venom.

Time was of the essence, and Lara quickly worked to photograph the remainder of the carved stone tablets.

Minutes passed, before Lara did a rapid run through of her collected images on the camera's small display screen. No Da Vinci or Picasso, she thought, but good enough to study later and pick out the details she needed. Her task completed, she stalked back to the small instruction tablet, remembering she'd seen one additional instruction carved beside the picture of the digital camera.

The next instruction appeared to be a woman, she supposed that was meant to be her, hammering the very tablet she was reading with what appeared to be a sledgehammer of some sort.

_No sledgehammer!_

Lara picked the next best option she could think of, which turned out to be a pulverising high kick that stretched her leg muscles almost to their limits.

The instruction tablet shattered amid a cloud of dust and the distinct sound of exploding pottery.

Silence reigned a moment.

Then a distant rumble began to reverberate through the floor, chillingly similar in feeling to the trap Tezra had activated in the picture galleries on their way in.

Lara looked cautiously around the chamber as small stone pieces began to fall and plink against the smooth stone floor. "Ooh _crap_," she breathed. "Here we go again." She spun and bolted for the chamber entrance, her long dark mane following quickly in her wake.

Tezra stood transfixed, staring at a carved window in Lara's copied room, which appeared to be slowly rising upward to reveal a passageway hidden behind it. Realising Lara had emerged, he wrenched around to face her.

"What the hell!" he yelled amid the building maelstrom. "What the hell did you do?"

"Me?" Lara cut back at him. "What the hell did _you_ do?"

Lara's bedroom began to crack, like thunder, and fall apart, the four-poster bed imploding behind them with a stinging swarm of minute crystal shards that flew through the air and pinged musically off every single hard surface they hit.

"Goddamn nothing!" he vented. "I found _nothing!_" His brows knitted down into a look of venomous admonishment as he threw her the darkest of poisonous looks. "How can this be happening if we both did goddamn _nothing?_" He threw his hands up into the air to indicate the building chaos around them. "You Ms Croft," he jabbed an accusatory finger at her, "are _lying!_"

"Keep thinking that if it makes you sleep well at night," Lara replied with an uncanny coolness. She scooped up a handful of her long hair and held it out for him to see. "Believe what you want to believe. I did my hair and the place began falling apart. I didn't even get time to tie it up again. See?"

Tezra simply glared at her. He wasn't impressed, and he didn't believe her. His eyes hinted at a hidden madness, ruthlessly contained and controlled up until now, but now threatened to boil over in an uncontrollable eruption.

"We'll continue this later _Ms Croft_," he almost spat at her. "_If we survive_." His words dripped with sour distaste.

Lara knew something had tripped within Tezra's head, his behaviour noticeably different from when they had first met, as if a mad presence now fought to control him. It was a worrying development.

The window-door thudded to a stop as the room reduced itself to a hellstorm of destruction. Massive booming thuds cracked the stone floor into jagged and vicious fissures at their feet as Lara and Tezra sprinted through the newly appeared opening and into the darkness beyond. After a few meters, crystal globes erratically sputtered to life as if the mystic connection to their power source became momentarily lost with each shuddering pressure wave. The passageway was simple black stone, with only the occasional dendritic pattern of blue crystal weaving through the rock at odd intervals.

With no time to stop and study, they both sprinted with all the speed they could muster, Lara's gait being smooth, solid, and refined, but Tezra's marred by his injured leg. Unhindered, powerful destruction followed ruthlessly at their heels. Hidden mechanics, which for hundreds of years had lain in wait for this very moment, were now battering the entire subterranean space out of existence. It was as if the Earth's massive tectonic plates had suddenly shifted, creating an earthquake of truly epic proportions.

The entire passageway lurched sickeningly, violently fracturing the walls and floor of the overstressed passage. Lara stumbled mid-flight, but danced herself back to balance and sped onward. Tezra cursed loudly as he stumbled. Their ears became filled with the crunching avalanche that was mere moments away from wiping them off the face of existence itself.

The crystal globes flickered rapidly and quit to darkness. As if on autopilot, and unruffled, Lara reached for her faithful LED torch and bought it to bear against the thick blackness that had suddenly inked its way throughout the entire passageway.

Immediately, the light caught a T-Junction and Lara skidded to a stop, her combat boots bulldozing aside the fallen grit as her forward momentum ceased.

Tezra almost crashed into her from behind. "Lara get mov – "

"Shh Shh!" Lara whipped her torchless palm within inches of his face, battering his complaint to dust.

Sizeable stone chunks began to fall around them and shatter against the floor with ruinous anger. God only knew what manifested the hammering racket in the darkness behind them. Neither particularly itched to find out.

Lara tuned her face slowly toward the left junction, then to the right, and held it there. There was a breeze, subtle, but definitely recognizable against the accumulated sweat on her cheeks.

Lara bolted right in pursuit of the air current without a single extra word, her dark untamed hair streaming out behind her as she moved. Tezra could do nothing but trust her, which rankled, and sprinted off after her, barely ahead of the following chaos.

Shadows danced erratically under the beams of their flash-dancing torches as they ran, as if drunken on speed-infused tequila. The dead globes appeared eerie in the cutting white light, Lara's imagination toying with the theory they could have been alien eggs from some ancient-visiting race. A pity had it been true, as they were about to become shattered cannon fodder.

The gradient of the passageway began to increase, making sprinting all the more taxing. Lara swore she caught a puff of humid outside air, carrying with it the scents and smells of the rainforest as it entered her lungs and oxygenated her thumping bloodstream. She whipped viciously aside as she barely dodged a block of stone that fell from above, the unseen deep-seated hammering relentless in its deadly pursuit. Lara pushed for every ounce of speed she could muster, her long hours spent training and honing her body now paying well-earned dividends.

She knew though, that their situation was rapidly becoming dire.

Tezra yelled heatedly from somewhere in Lara's wake, but again, the time to stop and decipher his stinging dribble simply didn't exist. He would need to try and keep up with her, or suffer his own fate.

Another minute passed, spent bolting through the darkness, wrenching around several sharp corners, and avoiding chunks of overstressed stone that plummeted to the slippery stone floor at their feet and shattered like splintered glass.

Still another minute passed. Lara felt her lungs begin to burn, and the cloying tendrils of cramp begin to mushroom within of her now rock-solid calf muscles. With ruthless drive, Lara ignored the pains and drove herself onward, not even remotely toying with the grim spectre of failure for the barest second.

Suddenly there was light.

Suddenly, however, their entire world suffered a catastrophic hammer blow, seeming to rumble powerfully upward from somewhere down deep beneath them. Lara was thrown forward as if she were no more than the smallest blade of grass within a crashing river torrent, and she was sent crashing down to the now slick and sharp stony floor. Chalk up another round of cuts and bruises, she thought idly, as she half skidded and scrambled back up to take off yet again as if the man with the scythe was but a hair's breadth away.

The light seemed to hang in the distance, not getting any closer. Lara knew though that it was an illusion, and kept driving herself ruthlessly toward it. It was surely their salvation.

And then it was upon her.


	15. The Path of Chains Part III

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**Well - Hmmmmmmmm. I'm still not so sure about Pt III. It just didn't seem to gel as well as parts I & II.  
Still, like I've always said, eventually I have to call it done and move on. Otherwise this story will never get anywhere.  
So that's not me making an excuse or anything like that - just me telling it like it is. Some stuff you have a good feeling about - other stuff not so much.  
I think this is a 'not so much' moment.  
It's a tough call on how critical to be with your own work. Guess authors are their own worst critics when it really comes down to it.  
Such is life - as Ned Kelly once said.  
**

**Anyhow! Read on all ye faithful!**

**Take out the trash. And be good to your mother.**

**PS - Remember what I said a while ago about 'Masterful' and 'Genius'. *Ahem* Please feel free to add other comments along a similar vein ad infinitum...  
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***9***

**The Path of Chains**

Part Three

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**L**ara's legs and arms pinwheeled through thin fresh air, and the sudden blue intensity of the sky assaulted her eyes as though it were a powerful spotlight aimed directly at her unsuspecting eyeballs. The sun hung high over the horizon, causing her to slit her eyes against its sudden bright assault in an attempt to gain at least a small measure of vision in the brightness. She caught a glimpse of low and thickly forested hills in the distance, plus the fractured and angular shapes of a forbidding granite cliff at close quarters at her back.

Gravity gained precedence, and Lara began to drop like a stone.

She wrenched a look down, and saw the smooth, gently rippled blue waters of a large mountain pool sitting serenely beneath her – a long way down – but only seconds away.

_Crap!_

Lara spun forward into a swan dive on pure impulse, her crystalline thoughts ruthlessly taking control of her body, quickly shaping it into the graceful move. It saved her life.

She hit the water hard, the impact driving the majority of her hard-fought air from her lungs. But Lara held firm, and rocketed down deeply into the crystal clear void of the mountain pool, her diver's sense preventing her mouth from opening during the pain of impact and allowing in a torrent of cold suffocating water. She felt like she'd been thrown through the bowels of a rock-mixing machine, however was no stranger when it came to the intense rigours of biting pain, having experienced similar displeasures countless times before.

Lara's downward momentum became spent as she speared through the cold and icy depths, her resistance and natural buoyancy eventually killing off all downward movement, allowing her to begin kicking for the surface again. She was no more than half way up, when another large object split the surface of the water with a jet-trail of spinning and erratic bubbles. A quick glance revealed the object to be human. It appeared Tezra had made it after all, and seemed to have entered the water feet fist in a classic pin-drop formation. Lara knew the height from which they had fallen would have to be very near the limits any human could endure in a free dive, easily able to kill anyone who lacked the skill, and a tingling sense of urgency welled within her to check on Tezra's well being. There was no doubt the man was acting suspiciously, no doubt at all, but she wasn't a heartless cold-blooded killer.

Lara exploded from the deep like a slick leopard seal on the hunt, before taking a deep breath and disappearing back into the clear depths of the pool. No sooner had she scissor-kicked a few meters depth, than her eyes again spied the lazily suspended form of Tezra, his body seeming completely inanimate and languidly floating in the depths. She continued the energy sapping kick and swam further downward to his lifeless form, and placed a searching hand on his chest.

The moment she did so, Tezra's eyes sprang open and he became immediately alarmed, looking up fearfully at the quicksilver surface of the water seemingly high above and out of reach. He began to thrash and writhe in a futile and panicked attempt to claw himself higher in the water column and reach the precious air. But Lara knew, that if he continued in such a manner he'd never reach the surface alive, unless she did something to help his doomed cause. She recognised instantly the signs of uncontrolled fear in its purest form. Panic, she knew, was a dark and dangerous mistress to deal with. She'd need to be extremely careful.

Lara arced through the water beneath him, and then came up behind his madly thrashing body; if he'd seen her make the move, he wasn't showing the slightest shred of interest. She kicked upward with all the power she could muster, knowing that speed was of the essence, and grabbed a hold of his billowing shirt collar on the way past to take him under tow. His panicked hands immediately encased Lara's wrist in a death grip. Lara had expected something of the sort however, and continued to furiously scissor-kick and drag his deadweight up toward the surface, before his panicked mind could re-focus and madly decide to attack her.

The smooth surface of the pool shattered once more moments later as two human bodies seemed to erupt from the depths as if strapped to a V2 rocket. Lara immediately disentangled, and distanced herself a short way from Tezra's madly panicked thrashes with a few powerful strokes. Who knew what the man was capable of in his current, almost delirious state?

Tezra hacked, coughed, and thrashed madly, as if a thousand stinging insects suddenly attacked him. Most importantly however, he filled his lungs with precious air. He looked around wildly and locked his adrenalised eyesight firmly upon Lara.

"_Jesus Christ!"_

"No – Lara Croft actually," Lara called back to him with a trace of dark humour.

"Very fucking funny!"

"Calm down," she soothed purposefully, "you've got a touch of shock I'd say. You should know though, that I moonlight as a comedian."

Tezra breathed several deep breaths, and began to regain some lost control – and some lost dignity. "Goddamn black comedy!" he half yelled between breaths.

Lara smiled to herself, and began slowly stroking for a low rock ledge on the opposite side of the pool. Fatigue had begun to wash over her body, making her arms somewhat leaden, and her legs feel as if they'd run a marathon. The ledge certainly appeared inviting enough to stretch out on and take a rest for a while, just until the worst of the pains were sorted and she could sit and take stock of their situation.

The pool was hemmed in on three sides by sheer and jagged cliffs of greyish stone. A long, feathery-trailing waterfall dropped into one end, seemingly paintbrushed white by the brilliant rays of the sun. The waterfall appeared fed by a smaller watercourse that very likely weaved its way through the jungle before dropping over the cliff and diving down into the serene waters where they both now swam. The fourth side showed only a panorama of blue sky and the misty-green canopy of the rainforest, which stretched off into the distance like a fluffy green carpet. It appeared that the pool had been carved into the side of the cliff over the ages by water plummeting down from above and chiselling out a sizeable hollow. At least, that was Lara's theory.

Producing only a lazy headway that would be the envy of any holiday maker sunbaking on the beaches of the Maldives, Lara eventually reached the edge of the pool. She raised a weary hand out of the water and took hold of solid Earth once more. She looked back to the centre of the watery expanse to check on Tezra's progress, and it seemed he had taken a leaf from her book and was taking his sweet time following in her wake. She was about to call out to him to offer some tough encouragement, when she felt a sudden pressure against the side of her skull.

Lara froze, her breath becoming deathly still.

A voice, seemingly torn from the stench-ridden depths of an alien world, then rasped across her eardrums.

"Well well well," it sneered. "If it isn't the little Hellbitch herself, spewed out from the clutches of a pissed off Mother Earth no less." A deep laughter then ensued, before, "Ms Gods-be-damned Croft I presume?"

"No," Lara replied with a steady, dark stony grit. "My middle name is 'don't-frack-me-off' – rather than 'Gods-be-damned'." She began slowly turning her head to put a face on her sudden adversary.

"Don't move Ms '_Frack-me-off_!'" The voice commanded. "Else my Colt 45 and I will spill your brains all over your pristine swimming pool. Comprende Amigo?"

Lara froze again instantly. She'd felt the pressure of a gunbarrel against her skull too many times to doubt that what the voice said was true. "Are you the Fairy Floss Association by any chance?" She asked coldly.

A second unknown voice cut back in reply, feminine – but with a truckload of dire reckoning. "Little girl," it said with utter contempt, "we're your new masters, so the time to start doing _exactly_ what we tell you is _now!_ Your _pathetic_ life means less than _bullshit!_ Respect is your only lifeline. Comprende _Little Girl?_"

Lara simply nodded. She knew a checkmate when it was jammed against her skull.

The male voice chuckled a second time. "You always did have a way with words Elissa. Very poetic."

"Muffai Muffai," the woman said in return, her words charged with harsh sexual innuendo. "You're such a little man, but you do seem to appreciate my better qualities."

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**"Guns Bitch!"** Elissa commanded with a rough, combat-booted kick that suddenly snapped Lara's head forward in the water.

Lara's malachite, crystalline eyes became glacier cold. One at a time, she slowly loosened each of her Heckler & Koch pistols from their holsters and held them above her head, whereupon they were immediately snatched from her grasp.

"Out! _Slowly!_" This command from the man, Muffai. "Try anything and nasty bullet slugs become your intimate companions! Your friend can join the party as well – although he already looks half dead! Did you two have a lover's tiff?"

Lara said nothing, and slowly climbed dripping from the water under the intent scrutiny of the new arrivals. As she did so, she was able to steal her first real look at the pair.

The man was short, and barrel-chested to the extreme, suggesting he was no stranger to a well-used weights bench someplace. He sported closely cropped black hair that covered his head in tight curls, which made him look as though he could have been an olive farmer in another life, but the well-used Colt 45 gripped easily in his pipe-wrench hands threw that perception immediately out the door. He was calm and not even fidgety in the slightest, an experienced campaigner without a single shadow of a doubt.

The woman was a piece of work. Dressed entirely in black, overstrengthened muscles seemed to bulge from her body in every location conceivable. Her low-cut sleeveless sport top was skin tight, as were her jet-black bicycle pants, leaving Lara with little doubt the woman's condition could only be the result of a healthy supply of steroids. Her black crew-cut hair was all business, her almost-black eyes were devoid of humanity, and she positively _threw_ forth a darkness that seemed kin to Satan more than anything else. Lara knew after only a moment, that 'Elissa' was extremely dangerous.

The second her drenched torso was free of the water, oil-derrick arms wrenched her out the rest of the way and shoved her down to the smooth, water carved rock. Under Elissa's amused death-gaze, Muffai then produced a knife and roughly cut away Lara's backpack, throwing it casually aside as if it were no more than garbage.

"You won't be needing whatever's in there," Muffai said, with indifferent assertion. "You're the property of William Cortez now little miss."

Lara remained compliant and pliable, but her calculating mind began running the odds of each option of escape. She moved to sit on a small ledge immediately beside her, and casually began wringing out her wet, untamed hair, as if she sat on a sun-drenched beach in the Bahamas lazing under a coconut palm.

From somewhere, Elissa produced a shining black Uzi and had it aimed at Tezra's temple. He must have seen what was going down and had swum to the edge of the pool to meet their captors in resignation. Elissa grinned at him like a hyena, before reaching down with her free hand to grab him by the wrist and effortlessly haul him from the water, as though he were no more than a small stick insect.

Wordlessly, Tezra offered her his pistol, which she took and shoved in the rear of her pants. Then he simply, silently, stood aside in complete backdown, his eyes appearing dead of all fight.

Elissa slung her Uzi over her shoulder, seemingly completely at ease around her newfound captives. "Lets move," she said simply. "I don't want to keep William waiting for our report." She began moving off without waiting to see if anyone followed, but clearly expecting they would all do so. She seemed to be the one in charge.

Muffai shrugged, and leered down at Lara. "You heard the Lady. Shift your pretty behind before I have to ruin it." His colt 45 casually wavered to indicate the direction in which Elissa had begun walking.

Lara stood and stretched, her glacial coolness outwardly revealing she wasn't the slightest bit apprehensive. "Careful what you call a 'lady'," she said pantheresque. "Some of us might get offended."

A maniacal grin spread across Muffai's face. "I'll tell her you said that," he replied. "Then I'll sit back and watch the spectacle as she grinds you to a bloody pulp. You'll quickly learn that Elissa is – thingy about the way she looks."

"Still a fraction human then," Lara offered in riposte, "maybe there's hope for her yet." She then began a carefree stroll after Elissa's drug-infused form.

Tezra sullenly followed, while Muffai bought up the gun-toting rear. They made steady progress for a matter of minutes, Elissa setting a purposeful pace along the wide rock platform that led along the cliff face, and away from the pool. Lara knew her options were limited. But she also knew that once she and Tezra arrived –wherever they were being herded – their opportunities to escape would be pitifully few, or completely nonexistent.

Both Muffai and Elissa were classic thugs, Lara knew, although they appeared to be the more modern variety that harboured some brains as well. Bluffing her way out was clearly not going to work. Both seemed comfortable with the way they held and handled their weapons, again suggesting they were old hands at what they did. Lara had no doubts that if she bolted she'd quickly end up with a bullet-ridden spine, or a freaking bullet someplace or other she'd rather not contemplate. Both her captors appeared to have decidedly itchy trigger fingers.

Lara needed a diversion to muddy the waters and make good her escape, and so, she tripped over, quite convincingly. She yelped girlishly as she fell forward, adding to the charade.

"Bitch!" Muffai yelled with contempt. "Get the hell up you pathetic British _prostituta!_"

Lara sighed like a teenager. "Give me a minute," she whined subtly annoyed. "I think I made blood come out."

Muffai stormed past Tezra and shoved his Colt into Lara's cranium. "I said _move_ you fucking whore!"

Lara blazed her malachite displeasure up toward his looming bulk. "I said _give me a –_"

But two vicelike hands gripped the front of Lara's top and hauled her upward, strangling her words with ruthless fire. Lara came face to face with the lifeless eyes of the muscle-bound Elissa, but was then lifted still further until her feet left the ground entirely.

"You were saying, little miss nothing?" Elissa's cutting voice was akin to the most bloodthirsty samurai sword.

"I was saying you make a rusty D-9 bulldozer look like a beauty queen."

Elissa froze, her expression slowly changing to pure hate. Her clenched fists began to shake with pure anger that seethed and boiled inside her.

Lara smiled her best devilish smile; it was the reaction she was looking for.

"Elissa! She's provoking you!" Muffai warned. But it was too late.

With an immense yell, Elissa shoved Lara powerfully backward, making her arms and legs flail wildly with the sudden aggressive momentum. Lara's fate became set, and she could not help but fly momentarily through the air in a tangled heap, before she fell back to earth and hit the dirt with a solid thump. Only a keen-eyed martial arts expert could have picked the expertly acted, but ultimately controlled fall.

The second Lara's behind hit the dirt however, Elissa was upon her once more, cat-quick in her fury and hell-bent drive to squash her prey into dust.

But Lara was done play-acting the whining little girl, and with precise efficiency she whipped her legs around in a low sweep that drove Elissa's Herculean legs out from underneath her rippling body. The massive woman's eyes went wide with surprise, as gravity unceremoniously mashed her to the ground and sent her sprawling.

Elissa vented a gargantuan rage.

A second flickered by as Lara ghosted a concealed flick knife from her left boot and sprang forward to cut the sling that kept Elissa on a leash with her Uzi.

Muffai yelled, recognising her intent, and began shooting wildly in her direction with his Colt 45.

The edge of Lara's awareness registered the gearchange in the state of play, and she twisted her body to the ground to present less of a target to the hastily manifested shots, all the while attempting to extricate the Uzi from Elissa.

Another second winked out of existence.

Lara almost had the Uzi. But from within the depths of her rage, Elissa had also read Lara's intent, and reached out to take hold of the weapon in a vicelike grip and enforce a tug of war.

Lara's eyes fired with cold, calculating fury. She slammed Elissa's mid-section with her right boot, which would have sent most people spiralling downward into the depths of numbing debilitating pain.

Not Elissa. Her entire body was like a lump of carved and living granite, and the attack seemed to do nothing more than make her smile evilly. With turbo-hydraulic force, she simply ripped the Uzi from Lara's grip in response. But instead of using it to her advantage, she threw the automatic weapon over the edge of the cliff, no more than meters behind Lara's back. Her hellish grin widened.

"What do you think about that _little girl?_" she admonished. "I'm going to take great joy in seeing you bleed slowly to death."

"You're not good enough to kill me," Lara vehemently shot back through gritted teeth. "Just send me a postcard from the next _ugly bitch_ convention and we'll call it even."

That pushed Elissa over the edge. "Hell cat! Say your prayers!" She rolled forward with speed and sprang at Lara like a lightning bolt, and again grabbed a hold of Lara's midriff top and lifted her off her feet as if she weighed a pittance. "So much for your reputation _bitch_," she shouted. "William will just have to make do with your dead and rotting corpse! How dare you –"

Lara unleashed an iron-hard punch, as if she wielded a heavy blacksmith's hammer. Elissa was halted mid-rant and glared maniacally. Lara remained undaunted however, and followed up with a rapid-fire salvo of three additional slamming hits, each one more lust-driven than the last, and each connecting solidly with Elissa's demon-brawler face. Whether or not the hits rattled the woman's brain to the smallest degree, Lara simply couldn't know. Although bruises began to materialise, Elissa didn't even seem to register, or even care in the slightest about Lara's attack.

Instead, Lara flew through the air once more and landed roughly near the precipice of the cliff, half stumbled over. She took the chance to steal a quick glance down the rock face to ascertain what lay below, and the prognosis wasn't good. Her plan gone completely awry, she straightened, spread her feet, and raised her clenched fists in readiness. It was fight or die. Elissa seemed ready to bulldoze her off the edge of the cliff.

"Wait!" Muffai yelled. "Elissa! _Think_ for Christ's sake! Remember the hostages! If we keep Lara alive, she can be Williams slave, and watch her friends get tortured." His next words were almost placating. "Wouldn't that be better than just killing her?"

Then Muffai did something unexpected, he casually threw Tezra's Colt back to him and said, "Help me cover her will you amigo? It's time to unmask your true colours." Tezra caught the flying weapon, and a calculating smile twisted at the corners of his lips. He turned to Lara, cold and expressionless, took a few steps toward her, and aimed the gun at her head.

"Better do as they tell you Lara," he said evenly. "This is the end of the road for you."

Lara simply nodded, but her crystalline gaze skewered him with superchilled daggers. "A traitor?" she queried with dark interest. "How touching. I suppose you sold your soul to the highest bidder did you? What, pray tell, did these satanic fools offer you?"

"Not that it matters to you, _Lara Croft_," he almost spat her name, "but they offered me something extremely interesting for my defection. You see Lara; I've lived for over two hundred goddamn years, and this life bores me. It makes me _sick!_ They offered to make me superhuman! To be a god! I'm sick of pandering to old and useless _fools! _My destiny will be denied not a moment longer!"

"Enough!" snapped Muffai. "You two can chat later. But now for the coup de grace Ms pain-in-the-ass Croft, do you remember an angelic woman by the name of Seheira Sahain?"

Lara visibly stilled into a strange silence, her expression becoming tinged with helpless defeat. "You better prey to any god you care about that this isn't going the way I think it's going." Her voice was pure cut glass business.

It was Elissa who laughed with evil delight. "Or what? You precious preening schoolgirl, do you think your empty threats scare us in the slightest? It's three against one, _little girl_, and although I'd take great pleasure in separating each of your limbs from your pathetic body while you scream, I'd take even more pleasure in watching you scream while we torture your friends. We have a fool from your useless security company as well, just another death to hang on your _pathetic_ shoulders."

Lara's cold fury returned, and her eyes blazed from within, hell bent on punishment. Yet she was thwarted. "The three of you will die if a single hair on their heads gets touched," she said with icily calm resolve. "Doubt me if it makes you sleep at night, but I'd sleep with a gun in my hand from now on if I was either of you three." The angel of death had spoken.

Tezra had a moment of alarm, before it ruthlessly vanished. Similarly, Muffai's usually rock solid gaze washed through with uncertainty, before he too quickly shoved it aside and stood bemused and uncaring. But Elissa was affronted. She stepped forward with viperous speed and viciously backhanded Lara across her jawline with the force of a concrete battering ram.

Lara caught her intent a fraction late, and although she rolled with the blow, enough of its force rattled across her head in a thumping slam. A second blow came from Elissa in the form of a bull-thumping left-hander, but Lara was no fool when it came to simple brawling tactics, and slunk sideways this time to avoid it with millimetres to spare.

The second she did so, Lara unleashed a full blooded, split second forward kick that savagely connected with Elissa's forehead just above her left eyebrow. Caught amid the follow-through of her own slower attack, Elissa found herself caught out of position, unbalanced, and unable to block Lara's bloodthirsty riposte.

Elissa rocked backward instantly and yelled a deathly battle cry, but immediately rebounded and charged at Lara like a wounded bull, the blow seeming to have enraged her beyond control.

Muffai and Tezra pulled their pistol triggers almost simultaneously, sending bullet slugs fizzing toward their prey like shrapnel on wings of instant death.

But Lara was no longer there. She'd dropped backward off the cliff's precipice into thin air, surely to her death.

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**Muffai's eyes widened** in pure shock, his face unadulterated disbelief. Even he hadn't thought Lara would stoop to suicide, no matter how bad the odds had seemed. The same disbelief was mirrored upon the faces of Tezra and Elissa alike, and they stared at each other in askance and bewilderment.

"What the? She goddamn killed herself!" Tezra voiced in astonishment after a moment. He stood rooted to the spot, mouth agape.

"Did she mean to do it?" Elissa asked, puzzled. "It all happened so fast." She quickly stalked as close as she dared to the edge of the cliff and peered cautiously over. "Christ! It's a long way down," she added. "Can't see anything."

"I'm not sure," Muffai replied to both of them. "It looked like an accident to me. But… _Damn!_" He cradled his chin in his hand a moment with crossed arms. What sort of a person would commit suicide at the drop of a hat, after putting up such a full-blooded fight? Could she really have decided her situation was too grave, and chosen death over imprisonment? Could she really be that bold? He had to find out. "I'm going down there," he said after a moment. "I want to see her body."

Muffai lost no time in retrieving abseiling equipment from their helicopter, no more than twenty minutes away. Elissa helped secure the rope around a protruding ledge, and then fitted a radio headset over Muffai's ears.

Once he was only a few meters down the cliff face, Elissa came over the radio to make sure it checked out.

"Check check, how do you read me oh-so-little man?"

"Reading you five by five my sweet compadre, don't wait up for me will you."

"Not in your life! Kill the bitch if you find her alive, and I want to know _all_ the gory details. Leave anything out and I'll be peeved as hell."

Muffai chuckled, and descended, and soon became enveloped in a cloudy mist that rose up from a second waterfall that drained the mountain pool above. He saw no evidence of blood upon the rocks, or anything else that may have hinted at a bludgeoning blow to a human body.

After a few minutes of fruitless and slow descent, he hung above a rapidly moving but deep river pool that flowed off though a narrow chasm in the rock some distance away. The feeder stream appeared to cascade all the way down the cliff face, creating a series of pools along the way, before it escaped though the narrow chasm and out into only god knew where. From the humidity, Muffai guessed that the deep depths of the rainforest couldn't be too far away. There was a small ledge to one side, and he swung on the line to reach it, and disconnected himself once he'd touched down.

The chasm was wider where he now stood, but dimly lit, and fairly smooth sided. He looked up. Although the river pool was deep, it would have been a dive in a thousand if Lara had successfully pulled it off, especially given the way she toppled off the edge up above.

Then his eyes spied something in the water, caught on a spindly tree that struggled upward from a small collection of boulders that rose out of the water some distance away. Intrigued, Muffai had no choice but to jump into the pool and inspect the object further.

The water seemed chilled, no doubt from a lengthy time spent at depth in the pool above, but after no more than two minutes of Australian crawl, he had retrieved the object and had returned to the ledge. He pulled himself from the water and sat with feet dangling back down into the current to inspect more closely what he'd retrieved, although he'd already guessed with certainty what it was.

Muffai held the badly torn and blood stained midriff top that Lara had been wearing only a half hour earlier. It was a mess. It looked as though it had been slammed and grated along sharp rocks for hours, before being spat out and thrown without mercy to drown in the battering river torrent. If Lara's body were in the same condition, it wouldn't be a pretty sight.

Almost certainly, it seemed that Lara Croft had plummeted to her death, and her crushed and broken body swept away by the river waters never to be seen again. He grinned with satisfaction. Muffai would be sure not to mourn her death any more than a second.

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**The porcelain teacup** smashed over the highly polished marble floor with a shattering racket that heralded dire consequences. Thonapa's hand trembled with gutted defeat; his ages weary expression crushed and twisted with the images his sudden vision had shown him. He sank to his knees in a silent, gut-wrenching wail to the clouded sky above.

Visions had come to him at rare and odd times throughout his life. He knew not what made them come, nor how they were even possible. He just knew that when they came, the things he saw never made him smile.

_Tezra stood surrounded with an aura of unquestionable evil. He held a pistol to a bedraggled woman's head, her long wet hair hanging down to her shorts in unkempt jet trails. He cared not whether she lived or died, his fingers trembling over the trigger of the pistol, almost willing the bullet forth through sheer evil delight. The man Thonapa knew as Tezra, his own son, was there, but the devil inside his soul he did not know._

_Lara Croft plummeted to her death. Her steeled resolve fired through her clear green eyes, but the laws of gravity took a strangle hold, and she rocketed downward into oblivion. Her time as a mortal on this earth was surely finished._

Lost of all hope, Thonapa yelled one word at the top of his lungs, beseeching a shattered prayer to any holy deity who could listen.

"NO!"

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	16. Affliction of Darkness Part II

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**Hail! It's 1:00am and I seriously need sleep as I mash down the upload button for this chapter.**

**So much happened during the writing of this chapter it isn't funny. Just in the last few days my house was broken into and my laptop was taken off my hands. It had this entire story, plus this new chapter I'd been working on saved on it. Luckily though, and craftily I might add, I have a collection of thumb drives which I also back up my story files to. Damn lucky.**

**So this is to all the thieves in the world: Go jam a red hot poker through your chest and dance into the fiery pit of doom. When you arrive in Hell - Suffer Bitches!**

**So - well - I'm at a loss. This chapter took an extremely long time to write and get right for what it is. I like it, then I don't, then I like it again... In the end I found simpler was better in many many cases. I fully admit I had trouble with this chapter. I found it difficult getting Stan Forde and Seheira Sahain's plight across without going overboard, or making it too ho hum. Then, I edited it so much that I began to affect the whole flow of the chapter. Gotta watch that! Cheesy amateur gaffs right there.  
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**Apologies if this chapter grates. It itself was borne from troubling times. But - I am undaunted! I will return! So go get your chairs, your laptops - your internet connected doodad of choice ready!  
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**THANKS must go to Raging Bull, who is a close friend of mine and who is mid-way through a book of his own. His review of the prologue is truly legendary and deserves my utter praise. _When _Raging Bull's book is released there's going to be a stampede, sure as the sun rises. Just remember I said it first right here.  
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***10***

**Affliction of Darkness**

Part II

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**Lost. Deep within the Amazon.**

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**Stan Forde** stared straight down the barrel of a 9mm Steyr AUG A3 assault rifle, and then into the cold, expressionless eyes of the man who held it unwaveringly aimed at his torso. There was no doubt in his mind that the thug would just as soon empty the weapon's 30 round box cartridge into his chest as stop off at a seedy seaside bar for a pint of cheap beer and a triple-bypass hamburger. He could almost feel the thug's wish for him to try something. Try _anything_. Escape maybe, or attempt to pick up a pipe wrench and lay waste to his oppressors. Forde however, was not so stupid. _No dice_, he thought grimly. The odds were far too heavily stacked against him. Although, he had to admit, the thought of such action _did_ hold a certain satisfying appeal. No doubt however, the three thugs tromping heavily along behind him, similarly tricked with Steyr assault rifles of their own, would take quite a dim view of such efforts.

Forde smiled pleasantly at the gun-toting stationary guard as his attendant goon squad herded him past. No sense in getting offside with the locals too quickly, he thought. He had a vague feeling there'd be ample time for that later. The thug growled with bitter contempt, and offered him a bullyish "Hmph" in return. It was simple standover tactics, used by those who cared little for life, or much else for that matter. Forde had seen it countless times before.

Soaked by a constant drizzle, he and Seheira were being pushed and prodded along a shadowy jungle trail that only separated their bodies from a mass of thick and tangled greenery by the thinnest of margins. After meeting Sunset, certifiably the strangest and most troubled woman they'd _ever_ met, they had been marched off the B-17, through the vast and massive hangar in which it sat, past an array of mysterious outbuildings, and eventually out onto an almost-hidden trail running through the steamy and gloom-filled rainforest. Only God knew where they were going. Their captors had chosen to tell them exactly nothing.

Forde found himself smiling at Seheira, wondering at her fierce spirit, and her gracefully untiring fortitude. She still wore only what she'd been bundled out of bed wearing some long hours ago by the brutish thug Bez, along with a pair of running shoes she'd swiped at the last minute, and a borrowed Foxhound jacket she now had tied around her waist. Their bandit captors seemed intent on setting a fast pace, and her clothes were now so wet it was impossible to tell where the sweat left off and the damp from the rain began. She marched ahead defiantly, seeming not to notice the profusion of Austrian-made Steyr assault rifles at both their backs, or seeming too outwardly concerned at their dire predicament. Occasionally, she stole a searching glance back in Forde's direction, her eyes filled with the message that she was holding up OK, and also checking to see if he was also, before resolutely turning back to tackle the trail.

For the better part of two gruelling hours they did battle with the slick and winding forest trail, along with the thick and energy-sapping tropical air. Each stumble earned them a bruising rifle butt jammed without mercy into their kidneys, which produced a searing pain and nausea like no other. Forde neither whimpered nor cursed with each inevitable hit, resolving not to give the thugs a single shred of satisfaction for their sadistic urges. Seheira often stumbled forward ashen-faced with each blow, but always managed to recover her balance and produce a withering stare for her grinning aggressor.

Forde felt an overwhelming sense of uselessness. His inability to protect Seheira from harm and degradation threatened to cast him into well of frustrated despondency and ruin. But he knew that to admit defeat now was as good as signing both their death warrants, and he'd have goddamn Hell suffer frostbite before he'd ever allow that to happen. He'd thought about snatching a bandit's gun at least a dozen times since entering the forest, but that would surely be the quickest path to a bullet-ridden death and get him nowhere. As long as both he and Seheira somehow stayed alive there was still a slim hope of escape, but he knew that would entail making the most of an extremely unlikely chance if it ever chose to arrive. Better than nothing though, Forde thought.

The mid-morning light was having little effect down amid the confines of the thin forest trail. The grey, water-laden clouds combined with the thick treetop canopy to filter out most of the tropical sun attempting passage to the forest floor. The spattering rain felt warm to the touch, the equatorial heat staying put within the confines of the jungle despite the overcast conditions. Just as it was beginning to appear that the trail would wind into the endless forest forever, their surroundings began to tantalizingly change. Grey stone outcrops began looming into view through the thickets, and the trail seemed to take on an indescribable ancient quality as it merged with the base of a low ridge that cut through the jungle along a jagged fault line. Cut stone slabs began to replace the oil-slick mud underfoot, and timeworn otherworld carvings began to peep out from the stone cliff like lone and silent sentinels. Winged jaguars and strange dragonlike birds appeared amongst chiselled reliefs of rigid appearing hummingbirds and stylised monkeys. At odd intervals, squarish faces with oversized eyes and pronounced lips cast their gaze over all who passed them by, as if they could somehow divine every dark secret hidden away within one's soul. An unbidden shudder washed through Seheira's body at the sight of them; she could almost feel their searching eyes upon her. Somewhat further along the ancient route, the group came under the scrutiny of two seven-foot-high statues that stood watch on either side of the pathway. Their elongated guardian faces had almost weathered to nothing, along with most other details they had once held. Seheira could not help but feel as if she didn't belong in this place. To her, the statues appeared like doorkeepers, vetting out the unworthy, and keeping the sanctity of the place beyond intact. She involuntarily stopped, as if held in place by a mystic hand, and looked up into one of the almost supernatural faces in wonderment, but quickly received an insidious shove forward for her lapse in progress.

The sun had momentarily split the clouds when the bedraggled party emerged from a narrow cleft in the rocks and came upon the still waters of an old riverbed, almost lost within the deep shadows and overhanging ferns. On the other side, the stone pathway continued away out of sight. Nearby were the rotting remains of a living strangler-fig bridge, where ancient inhabitants had once trained and shaped the roots of a fig vine into a walkable platform. It appeared the bridge had once been quite a sight to behold, the main load-bearing roots being nearly as thick as a mans arm, and others intricately woven throughout each other as if by a master artisan. Sadly, the bridge now looked a forlorn husk of its former glory; it was moss covered and not long away from disappearing into the thick muck below forever. Seheira recalled a BBC documentary mentioning the bridges, and the families of the people who tended and created them over the several generations it took to fully form and grow such masterworks. People, she mused, could be truly wonderful sometimes.

Steyr barrel jammed hard into his back, and with the bandits' squalid laughter, Forde was ordered into the thick oozing slime first. Within a few short steps he'd quickly sunk to his waist, and it was clear his feet were sinking down into the soft ooze living at the bottom of the stagnant pool.

"Reminds me of this badly-run Club Med I stayed at once," Forde muttered with dark humour.

"Silence!" the goon-squad leader snapped. "No talking!" Apart from the grimy red bandanna tied roughly around his head, the bored squad leader looked a carbon copy of the seven other thugs who'd been given the unsatisfying task of prisoner caretakers for the day. He appeared to harbour a deep ill feeling over the assignment. So bedraggled and unkempt were each of their bandit captors that a cutlass and the heaving deck of a square-rigged sailing ship beneath their feet would have instantly transformed them into authentic Hollywood pirates.

Seheira was shoved roughly into the rotting pool next, amid amused laughs and lewd gestures from the bandits. Exactly _what_ had fallen into the putrescent waters and become one with the muck, she chose not to dwell upon. She gave even less thought as to what, if anything, could possibly be alive in the depths. Her feet quickly found where Forde had stepped into the mud before her, and she used the depressions to make her own progress, quickly finding it an easier prospect than forging her own trail. She sank to her stomach, and, to take her mind off matters, pictured herself wading along a crystal-clear beach someplace with a Tequila Sunrise in hand. Tough work; she couldn't remember a beach ever smelling like a garbage tip before.

Forde looked like a green zombie from a cheap B-grade horror movie as he arrived at the far bank and stumbled up its rain-slicked surface. Seheira arrived a minute later and took a hold of Forde's outstretched hands as he helped her climb from the grip of the dank pool also. They were both bone-tired and thoroughly bedraggled themselves.

"I have first dibs on the hot shower," Seheira said, as she climbed the bank in front of Forde.

"Fine," Forde grinned. "I booked the spa before we left town."

"You sly dog," Seheira replied with a flash of theatrical annoyance. "Nobody said anything about spa's to me." She fixed him a grimy smile. "So damn typical."

"I'll make it up to you when the next waiter comes past," Forde said with a dubious look into the steaming thickets beside them.

They both looked at each other and laughed.

Forde suddenly crumpled to his knees, and his eyes went wide as a searing wave of pain crashed through him as though he'd been hit with a cannon ball.

"English bitches!" a voice cracked from behind them. "What in hell is so funny?" The voice was Spanish, peeved, and thickly accented. A bandit had materialised from the jungle and rammed his rifle butt hard into Forde's already-bruised mid-section. It appeared laughing wasn't allowed either.

Forde grimaced as he knelt pain-ridden in the mud, before twisting around to serve the new arrival with a look of pure chiselled murder.

Seheira got the "Ssss" part of 'sick bastard' past her lips before she ruthlessly cut herself off, knowing it would do her no good. But the bandit got the message anyhow. He scowled with suffering irritation, stepped forward, and ruthlessly hammered her with a pounding uppercut. Seheira came within a fraction of flinching from harm's way at the last moment, her attention until now being mostly centred on Forde's misery, but she'd left it too late, and couldn't quite back away in time.

The blow was poorly formed, but connected decently enough above her left eyebrow, snapping her head back and also raising a line of weeping blood, along with a dark and nasty bruise. Seheira stumbled backward, albeit with a flash of defiance.

Forde quickly rose, unsteadily, blue murder written all over his face. He pointed toward the bandit with angry menace. "Touch her again and your ass gets sent to your family all wrapped in palm leaves with a nasty note attached." His eyes blazed. The threat held zero bluster, just the cold, calm promise that it would be so.

The bandit smiled through grey and crooked teeth, seemingly unperturbed. But a brief moment of hesitation washed through his air of cocksure bluster all the same; he wasn't used to having his captives make the threats, not when _he _held the gun. He pulled the trigger on the Steyr in retaliation and sent a thundering swarm of bullets fizzing within an inch of Forde's nose, the tirade also vaporizing a jungle sapling beside the trail with a shower of splinters.

"English bitches!" the bandit spat a second time.

A second later, the bandit squad-leader emerged from the undergrowth and unleashed a barrage of Spanish at the trigger-happy man, no doubt asking just what the _hell_ was going on, before eyeing Stan and Seheira like an exterminator contemplating a spider's nest. A few tense words were then exchanged between the men while the remainder of the party materialised from the shadows. From the look of them, they had found another way over the stagnant pool, as not a single one sported mud or slime of any kind. Terse commands followed, and the prisoners were roughly shoved ahead in response, Forde with a special ruthlessness, and the party resumed its forced march along the trail once again.

Mercifully, they didn't have far to go, and Seheira soon saw a large and cylindrical rock outcropping slowly reveal itself through the thriving mass of forest plants. It loomed ahead in the middle distance, appearing to her eyes like an ancient missile silo of some sort, except it had a collection of ferns sprouting from an upper rocky platform, and its cliff-like walls were jagged and fissured with age. As they moved closer, Seheira could see it was an ancient column of rock that had withstood the rigours of time, this last remaining piece being the tougher remnant of the material that had once surrounded it. It stretched upward almost to the underside of the treetop canopy, but remained secretly blanketed beneath, and camouflaged in the shadows. It reminded Seheira of 'The Cucumber' highrise in London, although, she seriously doubted this version would sport a cappuccino parlour of any consequence.

The mechanical sounds of a generator began to weave through the living symphony of the forest, which gave the prisoners at least small measure of cold comfort; it held the promise that the odd modern convenience could well be hidden someplace nearby. Seheira had worried, with some trepidation, that their fate might be a simple cage in the forest built to fulfil some sick desire of dominance their captors might wish to force upon them. Forde seemed nonchalant, walking straight and tall with squared shoulders and a do-your-worst expression cut across his features. Nothing appeared to be bothering him; at least, that was his outward appearance.

Ancient walls began to rise from the thickly carpeted forest floor in a broken and fading network, suggesting an age of greatness sometime long ago. No time existed to stop and study the ruins however, as Forde and Seheira were constantly shoved and prodded forward with cutting laughter and insidious rifle-butts from the bandits, just for the hell of it. The path became solid stone beneath their feet once more, and tendrils of deep-green vines draped the crumbling walls to either side. What the walls had once built no man could tell, their story completely unknown to the rat-race of the modern world today. Eventually, after several minutes spent weaving amongst the walls, the massive stone column again came into view before them, the roughly paved pathway leading straight up to a moss-covered stairway at its base, which in turn led to a darkened trapezoidal doorway set into the column itself. Clearly, the massive stone outcropping was more than it seemed.

Red bandanna man fired single shot from his Steyr into the air, no doubt to announce their presence to whoever may be lurking beyond the doorway. Perplexingly, as they approached, a man with a silver laptop appeared from the shadows first. He didn't appear armed at all; in fact, he had a distinctly non-thuggish air that was immediately apparent, and seemed strangely out of place. He sported dirty khaki cargo shorts and an equally grimed flower-pattern aloha shirt, along with elastic sided Blundstone boots and a tattered Panama hat. A moment later, Sunset appeared beside him in her slimline red minidress, and placed a hand on the man's shoulder.

Forde looked back to Seheira with a here-we-go-again look all over his face, but a Steyr butt quickly appeared from nowhere and slugged him across his jawline for the trouble. Forde's head rolled with the blow, blunting its main force, but there was nothing he could do to escape the left over power that jolted and rocked him on his feet. Pure and stubborn defiance kept him upright.

Red material fluttered, fizzed, and glided with ease then. A long silver metal object caught a faint shaft of sunlight and glinted, as Sunset moved toward them with fast and stalking fury. The man with the laptop followed slowly in her wake. Seheira knew the silver object could only be the katana that both she and Forde had seen across Sunset's back when they had first met her. The question though, was exactly _whom_ the troubled woman meant the deathly-sharp blade for, and _what_ had made her angry.

Seheira and Forde were stunned when Sunset swept wordlessly past the red-bandanna bandit leader, gave neither of _them_ a second glance, and made straight for the bandit who'd moments before slugged Forde with his rifle butt. A faint swishing zing sounded as the katana whipped through the air and raised the faintest bead of blood from the man's Adam's apple before he'd had time to move, or react in the faintest manner. Sunset's dark eyebrows drew her fire-crystal eyes into a look of pure don't-mess-with-me hate, and her sword-blade stare skewered into the bandit's brain like a superheated spear. The man looked stricken, and froze rooted to the spot, as if a superchilled airmass had suddenly engulfed his entire body and turned his pumping blood to ice. He could do no more than stare into Sunset's golden-yellow eyes and produce a strangled croak.

"Leave the prisoners alone," she said with a commanding tone. "Else my blade turns red. Comprende Amigo?"

The man nodded, shakily, as if gripped inside a crushing force. "Comprende…"

The bandit leader then chose that moment to boil over and lose his self-control. "Fucking Bitch!" he angrily accused. "You don't tell us what to fucking do! _Cortez_ tells us what to do! Not a fucking whore in a pretty dr–"

The wind seemed to flutter, and smooth red material glided and glossed, as if borne by the tropical air itself. Seheira's hair ruffled as Sunset moved past her in a blur. Although the bandit leader had held his Steyr Assault Rifle at the ready, finger tightened on the trigger, he'd never gotten the chance to take a solid bead on his target, and an instant later he found himself squinting from the glint off the katana's blade, now pressed firmly to his own throat.

"Thankyou," Sunset said with coldness. "My dress _is_ pretty isn't it?"

The bandit leader sneered and snorted, and made a show of being unimpressed in front of the men. He suddenly jolted sideward in an effort to dislodge the katana blade, and attempted to save himself from a certain truckload of embarrassment.

Sunset, however, was no fool when came to the use of katana's, and danced effortlessly to keep the curved slender blade exactly placed, increasing slightly the pressure with which she held it against the man's soft skin. The sword's tip drew a little more blood, causing a red trail to form and dribble downward to stain the bandit's collar. The bandit leader locked frozen again, and looked into Sunset's unrelenting eyes, which glared back at him framed by her shining tresses of blood-red hair. He paled.

"Ok señorita," he said, with a faltering lacklustre grin, holding up both hands in supplication. "You win. I am yours to command."

"Better," Sunset replied, without a single blink. "There's a boat tied up at the river dock with some supply crates aboard. Take them inside The Edifice, and then you can take _yourselves_ back to the airstrip." She paused a moment, then said, "And one more thing."

"Whatever you want señorita."

Sunset expertly twisted the blade ever so slightly, increasing the bloodflow from the small wound on the bandit's throat, causing him to flinch at the sudden extra pain. "_Don't_ screw with me again."

All bravado vanished from the bandit leader, and fear chilled over him, his eyes fixated on the death-sharp katana blade. "Sí señorita." He dared not move.

The katana zinged airily again as Sunset flashed the blade away from the bandit and drove it home into the sheath across her back. Within a second heartbeat she was a further two steps away from the man, out of reach. "Leave the prisoners to me," she then commanded, she would brook no argument, her lithe stance every part the confident samurai warrior.

Seheira shared a look of consternation with Forde, who was massaging some feeling back into his assaulted jawline. No words were necessary; they'd escaped the madmen, but had ended up in the viper pit. Everybody they had crossed paths with so far seemed either on the edge of madness, or was bent on meting out some sort of evil pain.

The bandit leader was a mix of fear and hate, but took off his red bandana and used it to clean the blood from his neck, before silently turning and signalling to his men with a few words of clipped Spanish, and then trudging off along another path into the forest. Without a single word, the other bandits followed, but chanced poisonous glances back toward those left behind, leaving no question as to each man's peeved resentment.

The moment the last man's back was turned, Seheira quickly moved to stand in front in Forde. "You look like Hell," she said after a moment's quirky appraisal, a faint encouraging smile crossing her lips.

Forde returned a sour grimace. "Well I've got a good excuse," he groused. "I've had enough rifle butts jammed all over my body to last a millennium. Damn sick freaks." Then he grinned. "Nice collection of pond scum you've got there."

Seheira nodded, and looked down to assess the green scum from the stagnant pool that had collected on her singlet top. "Yeah," she replied dryly. "The therapeutic package wasn't all it was cracked up to be."

A knowing look passed between the striking Sunset and the man in the Panama hat as they watched Stan and Seheira's light-hearted banter. They shared a delicate smile with each other, before walking over to meet the new arrivals.

"They made the two of you cross the old riverbed, didn't they?" said Sunset in her second greeting for the day. Her saddened, yet smiling nature had returned.

Stan and Seheira nodded at her in unison. Forde said, "Seems we were the floor show for today."

The man in the Panama hat smiled. "The two of you did well to arrive in the condition you have," he said affably. "There's nothing like a stroll through the forest with sadistic madmen to get the nasty bruises flowing."

Sunset crossed her arms across her chest. "Or to give your physiotherapist a heart attack," she added with rolled eyes. Then she glanced over her two new charges in a quick appraisal of their condition. "You guys _do_ look like hell actually," she said winking at Seheira. "Are either of you badly hurt?"

Forde and Seheira shared the umpteenth what-the-hell-is-going-on look they'd had with each other in the last 24 hours. "I'll live," said Forde, focussing the same look back upon Sunset and the man with the Panama. "But, as it happens, I've got a strongly-worded letter in mind for senior management that I'd like to deliver."

Seheira put her hands to her shoulders and tiredly arched the small of her back, stretching her complaining back muscles. "I never realised a person could hurt in so many places at once," she said with a subtle frown.

"Welcome to paradise," said the man with the Panama. He was perhaps in his late twenties, and it seemed he too hadn't seen a razor in at least two days, as he sported the beginnings of a beard, which seemed at odds with the gentlemanly hat he wore. He stretched out his hand and spoke with a Spanish accent, "Names Gareth Denn. Pleased to meet you, and that's no lie – we've had nobody but bloodthirsty goons to talk to for a good while now."

"Too long," said Sunset nodding. "There's two American professors working inside The Edifice," she raised an aerobic arm and pointed at the massive stone column behind her, "But they're kept strictly under lock and key, no visitors allowed."

Forde reached out and encased Gareth's hand in greeting, but queried, "The Edifice?"

Shaking Seheira's grimy hand also, Gareth replied, "Mine and Sunset's name for that great chunk of rock." he hiked his thumb over his shoulder to indicate it also. "Seemed appropriate."

Seheria could hold back her nagging question no longer. "So – are we…?"

"Still prisoners?" Sunset finished for her.

Seheira nodded.

"Unfortunately yes," Sunset replied, but quickly added, "But Gareth and I are not like the other people you've probably met here. In actual fact, we aren't much better off than the two of you; we're at bottom of the ladder when it comes to Cortez Inc. Cortez, or one of his demon-humping death-squad, will dispense with us just as easily as they will with you. The two of us just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, and now its do as we're told or disappear in the dead of night without a trace."

Gareth nodded, grim faced. "Cortez won't get employer of the year anytime soon, you can take it from us."

Seheira digested Gareth and Sunset's apparent honesty, but found herself with a nagging thought that wouldn't leave her alone. "Forgive me for being suspicious," she levelled with a calculating expression. "But why should we trust you? It doesn't make any sense that the four of us are being left alone, especially if you're on our side." She stood bravely, carefully watching how their new 'friends' would react.

It was Sunset and Gareth's turn to glance at each other; they'd known their friendship would be a tough sell, considering how Stan and Seheira had already been treated. Their cards would have to be placed on the table with finesse.

Sunset looked up at them with genuine understanding, and nodded. "Nothing to forgive, I'd think the same way if I were you." She then pointed a businesslike, yet somehow sultry gaze at the both of them, one at a time. "Of course you two will need time to decide if you can trust us, we know that. But believe you me, Gareth and I are quitting this joint the first chance we get. Expendable is our middle name just at the moment, and we know it all too well. Cortez will get no loyalty from us." Then she seemed pensive, and held her gaze on Seheira. "But you're right," she admitted. "Cortez does nothing without intricately planning it first. There's no doubt a good a reason we've been allowed to engineer some time alone."

"Could just be a sick joke on his part," Gareth suggested without humour.

"Possible," Sunset said, her gaze narrowing. "Leaving the four of us alone to discuss escape, only to have our hopes dashed later _is_ exactly the type of play he'd make. I think, though, there's more to it than that, knowing him like I do."

Gareth suddenly checked his wristwatch, and then looked up through the forest canopy to discern the sun's position in the sky. "Short time alone's over, we'd better move," he said, clearly not relishing the prospect. "Our doting minders must be getting touchy by now, and are wondering where we've gotten to."

Seeing the blank expressions on Stan and Seheira's faces, Sunset explained. "There are more thugs inside The Edifice," she said almost apologetically. "But they're no ordinary thugs. Cortez has – produced – a breed of supersoldiers – through the use of steroids, human engineering, and God only knows what other sick methods."

"They have bad tempers," Gareth added, once again grim faced.

Sunset nodded worriedly, her shoulder-length hair falling across her face as she did so. "They aren't human. Just try to do as they say, and _don't_ try to fight them, don't even think about it."

Forde put an encouraging hand on Seheira's shoulder, and she looked up at him bravely. "Lead on then," Forde said with an air of finality. "It seems our day really _can_ get worse after all."

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**Gareth immediately** zoned out and became ensconced in his open laptop as he walked; he seemed to have a well-honed sixth sense of direction despite having his face firmly locked on the small screen. Sunset took the lead, her tall dancer's legs striding confidently toward the open trapezoidal door that formed the entrance to The Edifice, the black ribbons in her hair fluttering gently as she moved. Forde walked beside Seheira, who despite her collection of cuts and bruises, and half the mud in the Amazon, still appeared as determined as ever. Forde himself felt like he had lead weights strapped to his feet, and fatigue had begun to shade his usually clear head, as well as everything else his nervous system was connected to. He found himself wishing for a modest bed and a minibar. Heck, he thought, even a pile of wet moss would do.

The stone steps leading up to the trapezoidal doorway were extremely old, loose, and cracked with age, their footsteps upon them producing hollow-slate clanks and plinks as they ascended. Similarly, the cut stone that made up the entrance looked as if a decent breeze would bring the whole assembly crashing down in a storm of dust and flying debris, should one choose to suddenly spring to life. No doubt existed in the minds of those passing by that the entrance had been constructed in an age long since faded from memory, the works appearing far too ancient to suggest otherwise. The tropical heat of the rainforest quickly gave way to a dusty subterranean cool as the small party moved through the doorway, and into the semi-dark of a sandstone tunnel. A short distance inside, the gritty and leaf littered floor suddenly morphed into a series of downward-leading steps that had been quarried from a dark basaltic stone, and seemed to soak up the ambient light like a sponge.

They passed by several naked bulbs that were crudely fastened into the walls to light the tunnel; they appeared to pulse in concert with the distant thumping of the generator, which could still be heard hammering through its load of fuel somewhere up on the surface. To Seheira, it gave the space an eerie otherworldly atmosphere, as if she walked through the tunnels of an alien spaceship orbiting another world. She had a sudden wish she could see the sun again. After several flights of stairs that spiralled downward into the bedrock, they entered a large dome-ceilinged room with swirling wave-like motifs cut into the stone walls. The centre of the floor was crammed with intricately carved stone sculptures of every size and description imaginable. Ornate and richly coloured ceramic vessels, along with others items that glinted in the gloom, were stacked and piled high in chambers leading off the main room. One chamber held a collection of human skulls and other bones that appeared chillingly human. The floor itself was detailed with carved geometric patterns and coloured with different types of stone.

Seheira gripped Forde tightly about one forearm. "What the hell is this place?" She whispered.

Forde ran his eyes over the cache of objects carefully placed about the mystifying room. "It's got to be some sort of artefact racket," he said in guarded tones back to her, without turning. "This stuff sure looks like it doesn't belong here, it's like a collection point of some sort for stolen artefacts if I had to make a guess."

Suddenly a rippling arm with a shining black Uzi emerged from the shadows, and rammed the weapon across Forde's unshaven jawline in the second such attack he'd endured in the last half hour.

"Scum like you _will not talk!_" a deep and broken voice menaced, still partly hidden within the musty shadow.

Forde gave a stifled gasp, staggered, and almost went down, but Seheira bravely kept a tight grip on his arm and held him on his feet. She tensed for a punishing blow of her own, almost certain her actions would be seen as defiance, but mercifully the blow never came.

Forde was woozy only moment. He rolled his head in a circle, and reached up with his free hand to clear the blood from a gash that had formed. With blue-icicle coolness, he fixed the shaded form of the supersoldier with a confident razorline stare. But said nothing. He patted Seheira's arm in thanks.

Sunset and Gareth had gone strangely quiet, and led them across the room to an empty alcove guarded by two additional blonde haired and flat topped supersoldiers, who appeared almost grotesque in their vastly over-strengthened state. Battering ram arms then roughly gripped them both and shoved them inside the alcove without so much as a word. They were prisoners.

Sunset stalked between the two supersoldiers unimpeded, and stood regarding Forde and Seheira silently, before mouthing the words 'I'm sorry'.

Seheira asked "What the hell –" But Sunset immediately gripped Seheira's shoulder and held a finger to her own lips.

Out loud Sunset said, "Please be quiet." She looked at them conspirationally, and then her face changed to a quiet sadness. She called for Gareth, in a tone that was both soft and commanding at the same time.

Gareth tentatively appeared, carefully eyeballing the guards, before slowly stepping past them.

"Where are the satellites Gareth," she asked him. However, it was clearly apparent she'd rather not know the answer.

Gareth opened his laptop and immediately looked stricken. He shook his head, as if his mother had just died. He looked at Sunset with a helpless pain written all over his face.

Sunset simply looked back at him and nodded. "Look after me when it's over Gareth," she almost pleaded.

Gareth nodded. "You know I will." A moment passed, as their eyes remained wordlessly locked.

Sunset smiled, but then it vanished. She choked suddenly, and doubled over as if suddenly poisoned. She sank to her knees in a silent scream, her entire body tensing and every muscle pulsing as if assaulted by electric shock. She then went suddenly limp and fell to the cold stone floor with a thump. Gareth quickly set down the laptop and rushed to her side, knelt down, and cradled her head protectively.

"Not fair," he whispered. "So not fair…"

Seheira and Forde also locked eyes, but theirs was a sharing of consternation. They both stepped over and knelt beside Gareth, but before they could say anything, Gareth spoke first.

"You are about to meet William Cortez," he said in a removed voice, as if he spoke from beyond a distant veil of some sort. Seheira gave him a look as if he'd suddenly gone mad.

"William Cort – How is that –?"

"_Quiet and listen_," Gareth said back in clipped tones, cutting her off. "There's no time to explain, except that with a few people, those with the correct brain patterns, Cortez has discovered a way to take over their bodies."

"What? Are you –?"

"I said _listen_," Gareth shot back again, his eyes filled with pleading. "Cortez will kill you," he said next, shooting them with uncompromising granite-hard stares. "Through Sunset," he added, looking back down at her. "Soon she's going to wake up, but you must know that it isn't _her_, you cannot judge Sunset by what you're about to see. The person who rises will be Cortez, and he's a _sick_ and _twisted_ bloodthirsty maniac. You must act like scum before him, because to him you are. Don't say a word, not a single one, unless he addresses you directly." Again he fixed both of them with a pleading expression. "He'll kill you just as he might swat a fly. All of us need to be very careful from now on. Do you understand me?"

It was Forde's turn to put a steadying hand on Seheira's shoulder. "Got it," he said, nodding with perplexed understanding. "Shut the hell up and act like miserable scum. Shouldn't be too hard."

Gareth nodded.

Suddenly Sunset convulsed, and her back arched high into the air. Her eyes sprang open but seemed to have difficulty focussing. Gareth, suddenly alarmed, quickly set her head back down to the floor and sprang back, as if Sunset herself was now poison incarnate. Sunset groaned, and she rose up on one elbow, her head swivelling drunkenly about on her shoulders. Her eyess opened wide and her eyeballs swivelled erratically in their sockets, before focussing on Forde and Seheira with demon menace.

"Ahh," she said, slurring badly. "The fucking prisoners. How quaint. I hope you're enjoying my hospitality?"

Forde simply nodded.

Sunset struggled into a kneeling position, although it was apparent her movements were quickly becoming less erratic by the second. "Seems the stupid fucking whore fell over again," he said to himself with disdain. "Stupid bitch."

Then Cortez, through Sunset, eyed Seheira and smiled. "And you pretty Ms Sahain?" he asked with a predatory leer. "Are my men treating you properly?"

Seheira nodded calmly and said, "Well enough, Mr Cortez."

Cortez cackled with delight. "You know my name! Wonderful! We can dispense with the _God-damn_ pleasantries then." Sunset's body rose upon her athletic legs to stand at full height, with only the smallest of stumbles. She pointed at Forde and Seheira, who still knelt down on the floor. "You two were going to be bait for that meddlesome bitch Lara Croft," he said with fuelled venom. "But it seems she took a tumble off a rather high cliff and fucking killed herself anyway." He looked almost remorseful then. "Pity," he said. "I'd have enjoyed strangling her myself. Still, you can't always get what you want. Main thing is she's fucking dead, and that makes me happy." He then waggled his pointing finger nonchalantly. "But now I really don't need the two of you at all," he said, as if in the middle of an afterthought. He looked at Seheira as if he judged a poor-quality painting. "I could use you as pleasure for my men I suppose."

Forde sprang from the floor, anger flaring. "The hell you will! I'll be a _dead man_ before _that_ happens."

Cortez regarded him with little more than utter uncaring distaste. "Whatever you want Mr Forde. Your death can easily be arranged."

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	17. South Pacific Dawn

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**Well well well. Greetings to you all again. If some mad fool had had the audacity to suggest I'd be posting this up a week ago I'd have literally died laughing. But here I am, posting up the next chapter in this intriguing tale. Look - don't ask me. I simply went mad one night and wrote the majority of this over several cups of coffee.**

**Now - this part of the story! It was going to be a prologue, or the second prologue. In actual fact I found it worked as both, so I've slotted it in as part of the unfolding storyline. *Polish glasses* - added a bit of intrigue into the mix for you all as well.**

**This chapter came dangerously close to being split. A knife edge away in fact, as I originally planned several other scenes. But those, I now realize, can come later and make up a pretty good chapter on their own. By my standards, I fairly powered through this one and enjoyed writing it to boot. Maybe, just maybe, there'll be someone appreciative out there in the great blue yonder.**

** Next up - there's Lara's death to get sorted out.**

**Words to work into your reviews this time around. Unparalleled, Masterwork, Riveting, and Sasquatch! There's a challenge for you...  
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**South Pacific Dawn**

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**The Middle of the South Pacific.**

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**Hungry whitecaps** marched over the slow and looming Pacific Ocean swells like an endless army of ants bent on a swarming and swirling attack. The deep-green swells endlessly rose and spilled over the bows, momentarily foaming the decks white as the saltwater energetically frothed and churned its way across the gangways, before sluicing out from the scuppers to return back to the mighty sea. The wind drove in from the southeast at a spirited 30 knots, and only the occasional shaft of sunlight broke through the steel grey clouds overhead, draping the tumbling waves across the horizon with a patchwork of colour.

Ensconced in the early dawn, Captain Matthew Stewart stood on the open bridge of the British liquefied natural gas carrier _Southern Spirit_ and aimed his binoculars at another LNG carrier wallowing dead amid the waves. She was massive; her hull was painted bright red, and her upper works Antarctic white. Like his own ship, there were no windows or ports along her voluminous sides of any kind, with the exception of the bridge and the crew's quarters on the upper deck. Unlike the _Southern Spirit_ however, the ship in his sights did not have the rounded style LNG tanks, but rather had the more modern versions that sat lower amid the ship, appearing outwardly like a huge matchbox sitting atop an airfield.

Stewart noted with gathering consternation the telltale signs of a slight list, below ten degrees to be certain, but rolling to fifteen as the powerful mid-ocean swells broke against her exposed starboard side. There appeared to be no signs of life anywhere along the expansive superstructure: there were no lights, and no men running along the decks going about their daily tasks. She was a dark and imposing mystery. He sighed with concern etched across his weathered features, and turned the binoculars to focus upon the ship's name, stencilled in white letting across the bow.

She was the _British Emerald._

The ship was no stranger to Stewart, nor any man who captained an LNG tanker the world over. The _British Emerald_ was considered to be one of the largest, and most technically advanced LNG carriers ever built. He knew her length to be in the order of 288 meters, with a breadth of around 44, and she contained one of the most sophisticated LNG transport systems ever devised. What mystified Stewart the most however, was the fact that the _British Emerald_ had well known routes of operation in the _northern_ hemisphere, so just what the hell the ship was doing in the middle of the Southern Pacific was any man's guess. Adding to the mystery was the fact that _Southern Spirit_ had strayed far from established shipping lanes herself, by special order of the British Government, the details and reasons for which kept far from the likes of Stewart.

Stewart gave the ship one final sweep with the binoculars, before heading inside to the comfort of the central bridge. He propped himself amid the doorframe of the communications room. "Anything?"

The radio operator shook his head, his long Jamaican dreadlocks dancing a jig as he did so. "Not a thing man. I've received nothing but static since we appeared over the horizon a few miles back and spotted her. They must have a massive breakdown over there or something. Seems strange they wouldn't have tried to signal us _somehow_ thoughman. I'm even open to Morse-bejeezuz-code at this point."

Stewart nodded. "Strange all right Mr Stentz. Keep trying, and I might just take you up on that Morse code idea of yours."

Returning to the bridge, Stewart stared silently through the ship's windows at the British tanker, now drifting less than a kilometre off his Port rail. From somewhere, a deep-seated foreboding drifted across him. Something was definitely amiss, and he knew it. Stewart had spent the better part of thirty years at sea, and at nearly sixty years of age his close-cropped beard had gone grey, as had the bushy eyebrows that capped his ages-wary ice-blue eyes. He had a well-earned reputation of a man who didn't rattle easily, and was a man never known to give in to rash decisions. He'd been offered promotions into desk jobs several times over in the past, but had turned each down without a second's thought. The sea was the place for him; there'd be time enough for rotting at a desk later.

Just by looking at the silent supertanker, without the faintest sign of activity, and clearly not sitting right in the water, he could tell something serious must have happened for the ship to remain unresponsive to radio calls, and to be drifting aimlessly against such heavy seas. There could be no doubt she was heavily loaded to the stoppers with Liquefied Natural Gas, as she sat deep in the water with only a glimpse of her loadline appearing between the restless swells. God only knew what the status of the LNG tanks would be if all systems were down. God help them, or anyone attempting salvage, if any of the tanks aboard had ruptured or sprung a leak. And good luck with getting such a massive ship under tow in the first place, he thought resignedly.

Stewart placed both hands on the rail in front of the windows and inwardly cursed. The dawn light was still too meagre to make any real judgement as to her condition, yet if her crew was in trouble the laws of the sea compelled him to attempt a rescue if at all humanly possible. The only sane course open to him was to wait another hour and hope the added daylight might reveal something more, and hope to hell the crew were unharmed in the meantime.

A steaming mug of freshly brewed coffee appeared before him. "Coffee Sir?"

Stewart looked across into the wiry features of Chief Officer Andrew Lacey. The eye's that stared back were cobalt, and alert. Lacey stood tall at over six feet, had a straw-coloured short back and sides haircut, and sported a distinct tan from many hours spent surfing off remote beaches in Australia. He was a man who was no stranger to a little hard work, and had the respect of every man aboard the ship.

Steward nodded his gratitude and took the proffered steaming mug. "Can't raise a damn thing on the radio Andrew. I don't like it."

Lacey moved to the rail beside Stewart and fixed his gaze upon the deadened ship. "Ship like that," he began, " doesn't just fall dead in the middle of the ocean and take on a list without a damn good reason."

"You thinking foul play?" Stewart asked.

"Considering the reason we're here sir, you'd have to assume the _British Emerald_ got the same strange orders we did. Why the hell-else is a massive LNG tanker like that anywhere near this place? This isn't a shipping lane, and it's goddamn about as far as you can get from anywhere on Earth."

Stewart took a healthy gulp from his coffee mug and sighed. "That's the damn-straight of it," he replied, nodding slightly. "All that trouble recently with gas, and other energy supples to Britain," he ticked them off on his fingers, "oil, gas, that undersea power cable from Iceland, that Drax Group coal-fired power station explosion a few months back, shipping avoiding the UK like the plague – and now this." He nodded again out the window. "Can't help but feel like our mission was meant to be a covert operation to get supplies back into the UK, but someone found us out and took exception."

Lacey nodded pensively, and slowly, before turning to Stewart. "Some sort of terrorist operation?" he queried. "Bring down the UK by limiting all sources of energy into the region? That would take one _hell_ of an operation."

"No doubt," Stewart said, eyeing him briefly. "But even Blind Freddy could see that _something_ is the hell going on. It's just that London is staying silent while they try and sort it."

Lacey considered Stewart's hypothesis a moment. "The _British Emerald_ could have had a legitimate failure sir. There may not be anything sinister about it."

Stewart cocked an eyebrow. "A complete power failure with all backup systems gone? Even _we_ have battery operated backup systems and distress beacons, the _British Emerald_ would sport no less. With the kind of cash her owners have on hand, I'd bet she has a whole lot _more_ than that."

Lacey nodded in quick acquiescence, knowing he could offer no further reasoned thoughts to why the _British Emerald_ was in seemingly dire straits. The truth was, from the moment he'd laid eyes on the ghostly-silent ship, he'd also developed an extremely bad feeling about the whole situation. The energy crisis in Britain was big news at the moment, with analysts predicting severe shortages unless something could be done. It all grimly fitted together. He sighed with sudden consternation, and took another searching look out across the waves. "Is the same fate waiting for us do you think?" he questioned.

"Damned if I know Andrew. But we can't leave until we know for sure that there's nobody alive or hurt over there." Stewart gave a tense but chiselled look to his Chief Officer. "I'll never sleep at night if we walk away from this, no matter the dangers, and neither will you."

"If it was us over there," Lacey agreed solemnly, "we'd expect the same of them."

"Damn straight we would," Stewart replied without hesitation.

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**An hour later**, with the dawn strengthened into a lighter shade of grey, and with an additional boarding party of three, Chief Officer Lacey stood at the tiller of an 18 foot Hydrofield runabout, and had made good a quarter of the distance between the two ships. If the waves and mid-ocean swells had looked agitated and angry from the bridge of the _Southern Spirit_, they looked positively gargantuan through the plexiglass windows of the far smaller runabout. Lacey found he had to keep a tight grip on the throttles of the twin Yamaha 90 horsepower outboards, powering up the faces of the massive swells, before deftly easing off as they tipped over the crests amid a shower of seaspray and shot down the other side. Truth be told, Lacey knew the conditions were dangerous, a little too much so to be doing what they were, but weather reports suggested that this was as good as it was going to get for weeks, so it was now or never.

Along for the ride were the ship's doctor and nurse Stephanie Dulverson, ex oil fitter and platform worker Olaf Sheen, and the ships engineering offsider, Aaron Feist. Each hung on for dear life as the Hydrofield pitched and rolled without mercy like a cork on the tormented sea. There was no time to worry about the showers of chill water raining over the side, thrown up by each dwarfing wave, as simply remaining upright was challenge enough.

Twenty minutes later, Lacey eased into the lee of the massive ship where conditions were marginally better, but were still treacherous enough to throw and splinter them against the steel hull of the ship if they weren't careful. It was risky, and Lacey knew it.

"Get me close!" yelled Olaf over the shriek of the low-latitude wind. "I'll give the grappling hook a whirl!"

Lacey nodded to him in fast agreement, before tuning back to steadily pilot the boat to within ten meters of the ominously-rolling and massive steel hull of the _British Emerald_. Though retired, Olaf had the physique of an international rugby player, and even through the layers of his foul weather gear his massive arms and wide shoulders were readily apparent. He grinned through a black biker's moustache as he coiled the line attached to a stainless steel grappling hook for his first attempted throw. He appeared to be the only one enjoying himself in the inhospitable conditions.

After twelve attempts, and several perilously-near misses, it was apparent a change in tactics would be required. Lacey judged the timing of the big swells as they rolled through, and closed the distance between themselves and the massive ship a shade more between wave crests, allowing Olaf to be closer to his target for each throw. After an additional six such manoeuvres, and with Olaf beginning to tire amid strained curses, the grappling hook finally sailed over the railing and caught fast around something up on the decks above. Whoops from each member of the boarding party resulted, along with a hearty slap on Olaf's back from Feist.

Lacey had to move the Hydrofield out of danger for an additional ten minutes as a set of larger waves rolled through, making the massive ship roll over perilously, and tossing their small craft in every direction as though inside an erratic vortex. Eventually, the seas calmed enough to close the distance once again and Olaf handed the rope to Feist, who'd drawn the short straw to attempt the boarding first. In truth, Feist was an amateur rock climber, and could well enough handle a climbing rope, but rappelling up the side of a slick and wet LNG carrier in rough seas was another matter entirely. He grimly held the rope and eyed the massive hulk of the ship before him, then glanced at the massive waves beyond the ship. "Tell my wife and kids I love them," he said, as he lost a shade of colour.

They could only afford a quick pass close enough to the ship to pull off Feist's risky exit. Pulling the rope taut, and just as Lacey gunned the Hydrofield away from the _British Emerald's_ solid hull, Feist stepped out above the water and gripped onto the rope for dear life. Despite being slammed against the side of the ship several times, Feist made slow but steady progress, although Lacey was left with little doubt the man would be putting in for a holiday the second the _Southern Spirit_ next made port. After several minutes struggle, and clearly spent, Feist eventually gripped the railing of the massive ship and hauled himself over. Minutes later, a cable boarding ladder came cascading over the side and played out no more than a meter above the waterline.

"Damn," Olaf vented in jibe, his eternal grin again in evidence. "Looks like he made it. Guess I'm the next guinea pig."

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**Twenty minutes later**, Lacey stood on the deck of the _British Emerald_ along with Olaf and Feist. Steph had volunteered to take over the helm of the Hydrofield, as someone had needed to stay and keep control of it in the bleak and terrible conditions. Lacey bent over the railing and waved to her as she made one final pass in the washing-machine maelstrom below. She waved back, clearly relieved that all three men had made the decks without incident, before heading out away from the ship to wait.

Staying together, the three men made a quick search of the decks for any tell tale signs of life. They found nothing. Beneath their feet, the ship simply didn't feel right. It felt overly ponderous and heavy, and slow to right itself after wallowing down into the troughs between the swells. Lacy had sworn the ship had taken on a few extra degrees list as he himself had climbed the boarding ladder, and he was intent that they waste as little time as possible.

Next, they climbed a set of metal stairs leading to the bridge and crews quarters. Arriving at the head of the stairs, they found a metal door ominously swinging loose on its hinges in the wind, and banging loudly as the ship moved. Beyond the portal it was dark, and to a man, each of the new arrivals suddenly wished they were elsewhere.

"I've got a less-than-bad feeling about this," Olaf announced flatly.

"Join the club," Lacey replied uneasily, before turning to face his two colleagues. "Ok," he said. "We go in. But we stick together at all times. Got it?" Feist and Olaf nodded agreement. "The first whiff of something we can't handle and we beat an instant retreat. I plan on raising hell in a retirement home in my old age, right?"

"Sure thing Chief," Feist agreed. Olaf simply nodded, his grin finally gone.

None of the lights worked, making navigation within the confined internal passageways difficult. An occasional salt-encrusted window allowed the grey dawn light to filter through weakly and provide a modicum of illumination. Even so however, large sections of passageway were still mired in near-complete shadow. Added to that, it was clear that this section of the ship was a complete mess. All side doors had been thrown open and the contents of the room beyond strewn about in complete chaos, as if drug-happy thugs had broken in and trashed the place. One room was clearly a store of some sort, holding all manner of brooms, cleaning liquids and touch-up paint. Another held bedding, ominously ripped to shreds by only god knew what. It wasn't until Chief Lacey peered cautiously around the doorframe of the sixth room that he spied a well-used penlight jammed amid a jumble of pens and markers inside a coffee jar. He cursed the fact he'd not thought to bring his own torch in case the lights were out.

The penlight's beam was yellow, but seemed serviceable enough. The men stepped amid an increasing array of mess, which had been spilled from the rooms to either side of the passageway. The ship seemed as silent as the grave as they came upon a central stairwell, both leading up no doubt to the bridge, and also down into the bowels of the ship. They took a vote and ascended the stairs to the bridge first.

Arriving at the top of the stairwell, they were greeted by a green-carpeted foyer with blue panelled walls, fake potplants, and pictures hanging on the walls depicting various other tankers and cargo ships of note. Leather chairs also sat arrayed around a glass coffee table with copies of the London Daily and Daily Mail newspapers strewn across it. Lacey bent down to pick up a copy.

"This is four months old," he revealed to the others. "This whole box and dice gets better and better."

"No way the _British Emerald_ would have four-month-old newspapers hanging around," Feist said grimly. "She'd never be away from a port long enough."

"So she's been drifting the seas for months then?" Olaf pondered. "No way. _Someone_ would have reported her missing, surely to god."

"Maybe they did," Lacey replied, eying the news story on the newspaper's cover, "but it was hushed over to keep some international incident under wraps. Something that _somebody_ didn't want to come out."

"Either way," Olaf sighed looking about the foyer, "I vote we do the checks we came to do and then get the hell out. Something happened here, and I don't think it will be good for our health if we get caught up in it."

"Amen to that," Feist murmured with a shiver.

"Let's haul ass then gentlemen," Lacey suggested, throwing the newspaper back to the table.

The foyer was essentially a small room at the top of the stairs, with a single painted aluminium frame window to one side showing the view to starboard. The grey clouds overhead had not parted company, and the wind still washed the sea with angry whitecaps. Except for the wind whistling mournfully through the gangways, and ripping around the corners of the wheelhouse outside, the ship remained eerily silent.

Lacey put his hands to the brass doorhandles on the double doors leading to the bridge – and found that they only moved a little, clearly barricaded on the other side by something or other. He gave a silent glance to the others, before putting his shoulders against the doors in an attempt at bulldozing aside whatever had them caught. He got a little more movement before the doors again stubbornly stuck fast.

"Goddamn barricaded," he breathed, sounding not altogether surprised.

"Against what – or whom I wonder?" Feist pondered apprehensively.

"Time we found the hell out," said Olaf, limbering up. "Move aside."

Lacey stood aside as Olaf charged the door like a bull at a gate. He came on with lumbering, yet surprising speed for a man of his size, dropping his massive shoulders battering-ram style the instant before he crashed into the wooden veneer over aluminium doors. Something scraped and rattled loudly on the other side as the double doors jolted and moved under the assault of the classic crash tackle. Olaf grunted loudly with the impact, and he found himself jolted to a stop and doubled over with his face planted down to the surface of a heavy wooden chart table – the door-locking culprit. Lacey and Feist immediately rushed forward to help the big man right himself.

"Easy big fella," Lacey said. "Hell of a tackle old shipmate. You didn't break any bones did you?"

Olaf gingerly stood, and reached down to massage his legs. "No," he replied amid a heavy breath. "At least I don't think so, but I'll tell you one thing – I think I'm getting too old for this adventure crap."

"Tell that to the chart table," Feist chuckled from the side, not believing a word of it.

The three men heaved and pushed the heavy chart table further into the room beyond so they could enter. When they did, their blood ran cold.

The bridge was a warzone. Several of the large rectangular windows protecting the room from the elements were smashed completely away, others were starred and shattered to ruin, while still others were smeared and sprayed with what could only be spilled blood. Chairs were overturned, electronic consoles were broken and jagged wrecks, and the contents of every cupboard or shelf were now haphazardly strewn across the carpeted floor in a garbage tip mess. The bridge was sizeable, offering 360-degree views of the ship and surrounding ocean, and workstations were dotted about the space, which Lacey guessed were usually manned by members of the crew. Every inch was now in utter chaos, and looked as though it had been attacked and wrenched apart with an evil-as-sin wrecking ball.

Spying an ornate door off to one side, Lacey immediately picked his way through the jumble and took a look inside. Sickeningly, the sight he found was straight from the worst nightmare a person could ever dream. He reeled back from the doorway, as if suddenly struck with a sledgehammer.

"Jesus Christ!"

Olaf quickly vaulted a half splintered workdesk, and, reaching out to move Lacey aside, took a tentative look inside the room also. He was similarly shocked, and instantly looked away. "Saints of the Damned!"

The room was the Captain's private office, and it appeared the man himself was still in residence. However, it was plain to see that he had not drawn breath for quite some time. A darkened skull grinned forth in a morbid rictus smile, and the hollowed eye sockets peered upward toward the ceiling, as if searching for a way through, and out of the office come crypt. Bony fingers protruded from a crisp jacket sleeve and clutched a silver revolver pistol, which now sat atop a mildew mess of paperwork upon the Captain's desk. Lacey was no expert, but, daring to brave the grotesque sight again, he could see the man's death must have come sometime long before they'd arrived.

Forcing down the initial shock, and the bile that rose along with it, Lacey gingerly stepped inside the office and looked over the body for obvious causes of death. Taking the que, Olaf also entered and began rummaging through the paperwork for anything that might reveal just what the hell had happened. Within less than a minute however, Lacey had his answer.

"Poor devil took a bullet straight through the skull by the look of it," he said regardfully, peering at a lethal bullethole straight through the skull's forehead. He reached for the pistol the Captain had obviously had in his grasp when he died, and carefully disentangled the bony fingers from it. Then he ejected the pistol's cylinder to check the number of bullets remaining. "Still a full payload," he announced, eyeing the loaded bullets with care.

"So he never shot himself then," ventured Feist, who'd silently appeared in the doorway, and was doing his best to ignore the macabre scene.

Lacey peered at him thoughtfully. "Not unless somebody reloaded the pistol after he did the deed." He clicked the cylinder home and spun it, noting how freely it moved. "Any which way you bake it, seems like our good Captain was shot and killed."

"Which means we're in way over our heads," summed Olaf seriously.

"Amen to that brother," said Feist. "It's like a damn hit-squad has been here."

Lacey peered out the Captain's window at the grey, whitecapped ocean. He could see the Hydrofield battling the building seas through the wet misty haze, and wondered momentarily how Steph was faring out in the towering waves. There could be no doubt the _British Emerald_ had indeed suffered an attack of some sort. But why? And by whom? The mystery was maddening to say the least, and it appeared that no answers were going to reveal themselves too quickly.

He gave stern looks to each of his companions. "This whole thing certainly gets more rotten by the minute," he agreed. "We'll check the crews quarters for anyone alive, then see if we can't stop the leak this tub seems to have developed. One hour – then the three of us are gone, agreed?" Olaf nodded. Feist apprehensively paused a moment with a glance to the Captain's decayed body, and then reluctantly followed suit.

Lacey shoved the pistol inside a pocket on his foul weather gear. "Right, lets get going then." He said decisively. "This place gives me the Goddamn creeps."

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**Stephanie Dulverson** fought the urge to spill her hastily wolfed-down breakfast all over the deck of the hopelessly outgunned Hydrofield. No fool in their right minds would pit such a small boat against the massive deep-ocean swells that now loomed up over her like frothing liquid mountains. The marine-carpet deck was saturated from the spray coming over the side, and the bilge pumps screamed at full tilt to return the saltwater back to where it belonged. The small fibreglass canopy and plexiglass windows bore the brunt of the ocean's assault, and only narrowly managed to keep Stephanie herself dry. Her Polaroid sunglasses were beaded with salt-encrusted seawater, and her black shoulder-length ponytail whipped furiously in the wind. The idiot responsible for the weather report they'd relied upon ought to be shot, she angrily thought to herself.

Lacey had just radioed in their findings so far, and his descriptions left her with a deep sense of foreboding, and an icy chill that crept down her spine like a poisonous spider.

The twin Yamaha 90 horsepower outboards sang true and never missed a beat as she worked the throttles with the arrival of each wave. She aimed the bow directly into the oncoming wind, and also into the path of the swells. To align the boat otherwise would quickly have it filled with chilled southern latitude seawater, and have her on a one-way trip to the bottom in no time.

Stephanie peered over the wave crests at the _Southern Spririt_, sitting no more than a mile astern of her. She'd tried to radio in Lacey's findings to Stewart, but had received only silence in return over her handheld radio. Odd, she thought, the ship was still well within the range of the small handhelds; she couldn't fathom any reason why the signal wouldn't be getting through.

Suddenly, mixed amid the swirling whitewater crest of a wave, something caught her eye.

Stephanie tensed and peered at the rolling wave as it gained distance.

There it was again, a smallish black shape that seemed to have points of glowing blue light along its length. She craned her head to try and pick out what the object was, but just as quickly as it had appeared, it vanished into the blue-grey waters and disappeared. Too small to be a whale, she thought, and too big to be any sort of fish she knew about. Added to that, she could have sworn she'd caught a glimpse of some type of finned leg on the thing, but it certainly didn't appear human.

Stephanie quickly wiped her Polaroids clean, and scanned the surrounding water for any more of the strange animals – or whatever they were. She saw nothing but the now ominously dark water and deep-ocean swells crashing around her. Her spider chill intensified a notch. She reached for the handheld radio once again and tried hailing Lacey aboard the _British Emerald_.

She received nothing but silence.

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**Every single light** flickered aboard the _Southern Spirit_, and Jacob Stentz peered around the radio room as if a cold and ghostly spirit had suddenly entered and made its presence known. In that instant, the ships radar gave a series of solid bleeps, before going strangely silent. Intrigued, Stentz got up from his console and peered at the data displaying on a large flatscreen monitor mounted to the wall. To Stentz, standard radar systems left a lot to be desired, and, on the quiet, he'd boosted the power and sensitivity of _Southern Spirit's_ radar far beyond the out-of-the-box specs. Electronics were a passion, and a speciality of his.

He tapped the screen and frowned. "Capatain Stewart?" he hollered out through the open doorway.

Within a moment the Captain again filled the doorframe, stress lines and a lack of sleep clearly evident across his weathered face. "What is it Mr Stentz?"

Stentz replied with his heavy Jamaican accent, puzzling a look at the Captain. "Contact on the radar man, three solid hits, then two shadows, then nothing."

"Whales?" Stewart queried with a slight smile. He was well aware of Stentz' doctoring of most things electronic aboard the ship.

Stentz was adamant. "No way in hell man. Whales are easy to pick up, this is something else, something big."

It was Stewart's turn to frown. "Big?" he queried, smile vanishing. "How big?"

Stentz tapped the display again, pondering the figures he saw displayed there. "At least as big as us man, but probably bigger."

"You're sure? How far away?"

"Bearing two-eight-five, and a little over eight miles distant," Stentz replied. He then frowned suddenly, as additional data scrolled onto the display. After a few seconds, a deep worry washed over his face.

"Stentz," the Captain prodded, suddenly alarmed. "Talk to me."

Stentz peered at the screen a moment longer, and then slowly began to shake his head in bewilderment. "They're jamming us," he said in astonishment. "They're goddamn jamming us!"

A strange veteran's calm descended over Stewart, and his features became cut granite. "Are you sure man?" he pressed forcibly. "We're fully in the shitter if you've got the right of it."

Stentz produced a shrewd look. "There's a way to find out," he said with a sudden grin. He returned to his console and bought up a dizzying command screen, then faultlessly typed in a series of lengthy commands. After a minute, he sat back and purposefully punched down the enter key. "Take that you sneaky bastards," he said with a nod to himself.

Fifteen seconds later the radar began to bleep again, and Stentz rocketed up from the chair and intently peered at the screen. Stewart stood open mouthed, and also stepped up to the display.

"You hacked the system?" Stewart asked, impressed.

Stentz nodded. "Changed the radar's frequency to something off the books, and boosted the power to the stratosphere. Lets see how they like that?"

However, two minutes later, the radar again fell silent, and the lights over the entire ship again flickered uncontrollably.

Stentz fixed the captain with a rock hard look of apprehension. "We're in trouble. Extremely few operations have the capability and tech to do what just happened to us, and some of them kill first without bothering about the questions."

No sooner had the words passed his lips than several warning alarms began to sound and wail throughout the bridge and radio room alike. Both men rushed to the Bridge to inspect the sudden chaos. Stewart bolted to the LNG systems diagnostic screen and immediately became ashen faced. "Jesus Christ!" was all he could say.

Stentz immediately noted a glaring warning flashing across the navigation systems console, even as Stewart had cursed. "Jesus Christ!" he also blurted for himself, then both men looked at each other in bewilderment.

"You first!" yelled Stewart over the din of the alarms.

"We're way off course," Stentz replied grimly. "Someone has been feeding our nav computer bullshit. We're much further south than we should be, like near Antarctica! You?"

Stewart became a ball of rage, his fists clenched. "It'll be a Goddamn miracle if the gas tanks don't blow us into the cosmos within the hour."

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**Andrew Lacey** sloshed along an almost submerged walkway in the semi dark deep within the bowels of the _British Emerald_. They'd searched the crew's quarters and found nothing, except the same battlefield chaos evident up on the bridge. Feist had reported that every electrical system appeared dead, and that without the electrics in operation, there was no way in hell the mechanics were going to operate. The water was rising fast down at their feet, leaving no doubt that the seacocks had been opened, most likely with the intuition of sending the ship to the bottom. Even if they could get to each of the gushing seacocks in time, there was no guarantee they could be manually closed. With the lower sections of the ship now rapidly filling with water, there was nothing they could do.

The _British Emerald_ was done for.

The small party of three had just reached a metal staircase, when the entire ship suddenly shook violently amid the resonating boom of a sudden explosion. Lacey was thrown down against the cold wet stairs. Feist's head smacked into a vertical railing, leaving him dazed, and Olaf overbalanced backward into the ever-deepening water.

"What the HELL was that?" Olaf yelled as he sloshed back onto his feet. Feist groaned.

"The signal for us to get the hell off this deathtrap," Lacey yelled back over the booming reverberations and metallic groans the noise had left in its wake. He slapped Feist on the shoulder. "You OK compadre?"

"I think I broke something," he replied mournfully. "But the hell with it, I'm off this tub like rotten fish in a restaurant."

Having found a cache of waterproof Dolphin torches in the crew's quarters, they bolted along the confined passageways and up the darkened staircases, navigating purely on Lacey's recollection of their trip downward. Lacey could only hope that his recollection of the route was on the money, or else a cold and solitary drowning awaited them.

They were thrown to the linoleum flooring yet again as again the ship suddenly jolted and shivered violently amid the sounds of wrenching bulkheads and high explosive. The wall of the corridor suddenly burst inward as if a massive bulldozer had suddenly rammed it from the other side. The passageway immediately filled with choking black smoke and the fired resinous smells of burning chemicals.

Lacey coughed violently and spun around on the floor to check on the others, trying to keep below the pall of smoke. He found Feist first, and knew he was dead. He cursed a wrenching yell of despondency at the battered form of his friend in the dim glow of his Dolphin torch.

Olaf's bruised face appeared in the gloom. "He's gone old pal," he said sorrowfully amid the chaos. The ship slammed again, this time further away from where they now were, but the force was enough to rattle the two living men. "We have to go," Olaf almost commanded. "Else we'll end up the same as him."

Lacey nodded decisively, and the two fugitives resumed their flight though the bowels of the dying ship.

Amid the fatal death groans of tortured metal, Lacey and Olaf eventually burst out onto the decks, with Olaf repeating his door-opening crash tackle on a locked door that led to the outside. The smoke infused winds immediately whipped at their faces, and both men gaped open mouthed at the destruction that greeted them.

The upperworks were now a twisted and smoking mess, with massive, gaping, and jagged wounds that belched cancerous and smoking fire. Running out into the grey morning light, they noted the decks had begun to buckle as the ship sank and flexed in ways its designers had never intended. A great spout of flame jetted up from the ruptured LNG tanks, and reached high into the sky with a wailing banshee-like screech that chilled both men to the core.

Lacey spied the Hydrofield battling the ocean some 300 meters off the _British Emerald's_ bent railing, and waved his arms furiously to try and catch Steph's attention, his handheld radio having suffered terminal damage in the chaos belowdecks. After only a several seconds of this, his eyes caught a black shape moving at phenomenal speed through the air, and cutting a hell-bent warpath straight for the _Southern Spirit_. Over the mournful sounds of the sinking _British Emerald_, then came the unmistakeable sounds of a shrieking jet engine.

Lacey and Olaf ran to the now grossly slanted railing and watched in horror as a sleek black attack jet rocketed over the S_outhern Spirit_, and unleashed a barrage of air-to-ground missiles as it thundered across the sky. Both men were stricken with disbelief, looking at each other in helpless askance, as the Southern Spirit became engulfed in a series of death-hungry explosions. Seconds later, the explosive shock waves arrived, and produced a series of booming thuds that resonated within their chests, as if a boxer had suddenly pummelled the two with a vicious salvo of left and right-handers.

Even as the fireballs from the missiles rose into the air above their doomed ship, Olaf suddenly cried out and fell to the steel plate decking amid the sounds of what could only be described as a whooshing bullwhip. Lacey's sixth sense of danger hit overdrive, and he quickly dodged aside as a similar noise assaulted the space where his body had been a split second earlier. Pure instinct, and the will to live, had him yanking the silver revolver from his pocket, and aiming it at their sudden attacker.

If ever Lacey had ever thought he was slipping into madness over this whole maddening affair, then now was the time that confirmed it utterly. A humanoid creature, entirely black, and with what could only be described as batwing-like webbing stretching between two human-like legs, twirled and fizzed some sort of lethal looking tail in the air about its body. Its eyes glowed blue, as did several other locations over the thing's slick and shining shape. It's two human-like hands and arms were pure rippling strength, as if the creature had a diet of nothing but steroids and steel. It bared catlike teeth at the sight of the revolver, and hissed its displeasure at finding its prey suitably armed.

Olaf rolled across the deck and stood as the waves began to spill over the tortured bow of the ship. The jet of flame shooting into the sky halfway along the LNG containment tanks suddenly flashed with brilliance and doubled in size in an instant. The heat from the massive flame could even be felt by those on the deck, facing off in a game of death.

With lightning speed, the creature rushed Olaf before Lacey could squeeze off a round from the pistol. Within a second heartbeat, the creature had wrapped and slithered its greasy tail around Olaf's neck, and had him wrapped and held within a crushing grip. Olaf began to choke, his eyes wide at the sudden assault. Immediately frustrated, Lacey cursed, he knew he had no clear shot that didn't also involve getting Olaf caught up in the bullet as well. The creature fixed Lacey with a hissing stare of pure evil murder, and tightened its crushing grip on its victim.

Lacey knew thuggerous tactics when he saw them, and knew he needed to act quickly, else Olaf would be crushed to death. Olaf somehow read the dire bent written across Lacey's face, and mightily heaved and flexed his head and torso just a little further away from the beast. He gurgled out a strangled cry.

"Take a damn shot!"

The pistol jolted twice as two bullets cracked forth from its silver barrel. The creature seemed to read the flight of the slugs, and flexed its body, making the first narrowly graze its slick and aerodynamic head. The second however, found its mark, and slammed headlong into the creature's neck, producing a pressurized spurt of thick black slime. It immediately took one arm away from the grip it had on Olaf, and probed the wound with an amphibious hand.

Olaf still choked, but used his slight extra freedom to unleash a brawlers fist at the thing's head. The beast however was cat quick, and again flexed its head aside to avoid the blow. It punished Olaf with a further tightening of its coiled tail about his neck. Lacey, desperate, tried rushing the thing, hoping to slam it off balance and jam the pistol into its head. But he only achieved half the distance before the fishlike creature simply kicked him down to his knees. He immediately scrabbled and rolled across the wet decking, avoiding a series of following blows, before coming to his knees against the doorway from which they had exited minutes earlier.

Olaf suddenly grinned a devilish smile, and took the creatures head in both of his free hands. Lacey watched helpless, as Olaf bought to bear every ounce of strength he possessed, and with muscles popping, headbutted the creature to the sound of a wet and slimy crunch. With the creature momentarily dazed, Olaf put his massive platform-worker hands around the black throat of the thing, which had the effect of enraging it out of its brief stupor. Even as his life was being choked out him, Olaf produced one final heroic display of defiance, and, with a parting glance in Lacey's direction, heaved the creature off its feet and made for the railing.

Lacey immediately knew what the big oil platform man had in mind, but before he could stand and rush forward to prevent it, Olaf had wrestled the alien creature over the side of the dying ship without a second's extra thought, and vanished. Pure frustration boiled as Lacey yelled in thwarted fury and sprang to the railing, and peered down into the thrashing maelstrom of the sea, attempting to discern his friend's fate. He saw nothing but the angry waves and the buckled hull of the dying ship.

He could take no more than a second however, to lament the loss of another good friend and one of the best of men. The _British Emerald_ was sinking, going down bow first into the waiting depths of the South Pacific. She was sliding beneath the waves smoothly now, amid ghostly groans of tortured metal and escaping air. God only knew how long the ship would remain above the waves, minutes at best, Lacey judged.

The cold blue-grey waters came rushing along the decks as if a sudden torrent had burst forth from a mountainside dam. Lacey bolted along the sloping deck in a race for his life toward the stern, keeping ahead of the encroaching torrent with every ounce of energy he possessed. He tried to formulate a plan as to what in the seven blue hells he could do next, but before he knew it the stern railing was upon him, and he could go no further.

He looked down into the churning chaos below, and saw the massive propellers lifted clear of the water, and sitting in thin air. He looked back along the deck at the water speeding toward him, and knew he was surely done for. He had nowhere else to go. With a silent prayer, he took a running leap out over the starboard rail, and refused to look down. Before hitting the water, he wondered if this was to be his last moment on earth.

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**Stephanie gunned** the Hydrofield's motors like there was no tomorrow. Somewhere overhead, the jet fighter unleashed another insidious barrage against the _Southern Spirit_, causing more wrecking-ball explosive booms to echo out across the eerie seascape, before being lost in the frothing sounds of the whitecaps. With bitter resentment, she took one final glance at the receding outline of the tanker, which Stewart had begun steaming away from her at the first sign of trouble. She knew Stewart. There was no way on God's green earth he would abandon his own crew, no matter what the circumstances were. In her heart of hearts, she knew that Stewart had steered the _Southern Spirit_ away from the _British Emerald_ in order to draw their attackers' fire away from _her_, all but conspicuous in the small eighteen foot Hydrofield. It was exactly the sort of damn caper the man would get up to in his final moments.

Moments earlier, she'd seen somebody jump off the stern of the doomed _British Emerald_, and hoped to god it was one of either Lacey, Olaf, or Feist. The fact that she'd seen only _one_ person jump ship however, was extremely worrying. The twin hulls of the Hydrofield crashed and rocked over several looming swells as Steph put on as much speed as she dared. Ice blue water spilled and boiled across the fibreglass bow as she went, and drove into the plexiglass windows like there was no tomorrow. However the game little craft was not to denied.

The _British Emerald_ was finished, and amid a churning mass of chaos and groaning steel, she slipped beneath the waves never to be seen again. As her upperworks disappeared beneath the maelstrom with a hiss of venting air, Steph caught sight of a man in the water, swimming furiously toward her. She waved and yelled, God only knew if whoever it was had heard her. She rushed back to the Yamaha motors and immediately extended the stainless steel boarding ladder that sat beside them into the water. Returning to the helm, all she could do was try and keep the boat as steady as possible while whoever it was climbed aboard, an almost impossible task given the crap weather.

Steph guessed the current was running at a good five or six knots, and that the wind had surely strengthened past thirty-five. But even so, she managed to hold her position well enough for the thoroughly bedraggled swimmer to clamber aboard.

It was Andrew Lacey.

He grinned at her and rushed forward to envelop her in a massive bear hug. "Thank god for the cavalry!" he said almost laughing. Then, the mirth vanished and he became immediately sombre. "The others didn't make it," he said, seeming suddenly heartsick.

Stephanie thought quickly. "Could they be in the water?" she asked. Peering across the waves, she added, "We should at least do a search of the area."

Lacey nodded with impatience, "Damn straight we will. Do a full circuit of the sea around the where the ship went down, it's possible that Olaf might have made it."

"What about Aaron?" Steph queried, as she got the boat moving again.

"Not a chance," Lacey replied bitterly.

Lacey related everything that had happened to the others, Feist being crushed by the imploding bulkhead, and Olaf's wrestle with the strange creature. Steph looked crestfallen, and shed a tear upon hearing Lacey's descriptions.

"I saw something in the water," she said, after Lacey had finished. She removed her Polaroids to clear her eyes. "Had that blue glow all over its body, same as how you describe the one that attacked you. Any idea what the bejeezuz it was?"

Lacey was at a complete loss. "None," he replied with a shake of his head. "Looked human, but with a massive dose of fish mixed into the DNA. Safe to say that whatever it was though, it was aggressive and pissed off."

"You don't think it was some sort of alien do you?" Steph asked in bewilderment.

Lacey sighed and looked into her eyes with consternation. "Entirely possible," he replied pensively. "Lets just hope that if there's more of them out here, they leave us the hell alone."

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**Andrew Lacy** and Stephanie Dulverson searched the area for an hour, and although they came across various items of flotsam from the _British Emerald_, their good friend Olaf was nowhere to be seen. Admitting defeat, they turned their attention to the smoking shape of the Southern Spirit on the horizon – and found it gone. The entire time they'd been searching it had been there, slowly sailing away and becoming smaller with distance, but now it had disappeared.

Lacey climbed atop the Hydrofeild's canopy in a vain effort to try and sight the massive ship. He saw nothing but empty sea. He checked the overcast skies for any sight of the black attack jet that had pounded both ships, and had almost sent him to an early grave. He saw nothing but an empty slate grey sky. It was as if none of it had ever been. They were alone in the vast emptiness of the South Pacific. Only God knew what fate awaited them.

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	18. The Fallen

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**Ahoy there Tomb Raiders!**

**I return, to this entrancing tale of intrigue. Okaaaaaay! So I disappeared for a little while! But did you really think I'd disappeared for good? Well did you? Not in your life!**

**I like this sequence, it has a true Tomb Raider ring to it. Here's hoping all of you like it too.  
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**Please tell me if you liked reading this chapter. Your comments drive me onward...**

**EDITS**

**16th Oct - made a few small changes to make some sequences read better. :)  
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***12***

**The Fallen  
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**The Deep Amazon  
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**The setting sun** bathed the distant cliffs in a trance of blood red paint, and quiet winds drifted across the rainforest canopy, ruffling the treetop leaves like the crystal clear waters of a mountain river. Where the unyielding rock of the cliffs descended and met mother earth, the impenetrable and thriving-green carpet began, and extended to each horizon as if to suggest the entire earth might be covered. To the west, a line of dark clouds promised approaching damp. To the north, a clear and azure-blue sky lofted serene in deep-colour brilliance. Beneath the canopy, a winding river began threading its way through the jungle, its waters having recently fallen from the sheer heights of the mountainside nearby, only to quickly become tannin stained as all manner of plant life attempted to invade its course. The place was remote, rugged, and the last place on Earth a sane person could expect human presence.

Yet, slumped on the sandy bank, half hidden in the darkening shadows, and coughing up riverwater, was the battered presence of Lara Croft. Having taken more-or-less the same route down the mountain cliffs as the water, and having had less than pleasant interludes with every sunken log, snagging branch, and jutting rock along the way, Lara now appeared more akin to a homeless sea creature rather than the wealthy British aristocrat she truly was. So bedraggled was her appearance, that had there been a passing rivercruise filled with tourists, they might have considered her a hermit, or some mad alternative-type given over to a hard and primitive life amongst the forest. Theirs would have been the mistake however, to misjudge her.

Laid out face forward into the forest-floor grit, Lara propped herself up onto both elbows, shivered, and took the first deep breaths she could remember in a decently-long time – that _didn't_ involve water pouring down into her lungs. She felt like sheer unadulterated hell, and became painfully aware of the stabs and cutting knots that wreaked their havoc over the entire length of her body. She wore nothing but her ripped and tortured black tactical shorts, and a cropped black sport top that never usually saw the light of day. Each garment clung to her body as if glued, wet and dripping. Luckily, her boots had survived the horrors of the afternoon, although only God knew how. She noticed several bruises and welts had begun to appear, and from the back of her mind, Lara indeed recalled several hard collisions that had came perilously close to shattering her bones into no more than jumbled fragments. _Lucky_, she thought darkly, to have escaped the ordeal with all bones intact. She could have died many times this day, truth be told, but death was not hers to greet just yet. The man with the scythe would have to wait.

Lara groaned, with gusto, as she rolled onto her back and drunkenly sat up, wincing sharply as several raw nerves suddenly fired without a shred of mercy. Her mind flicked back to a particular class in highschool physics where a girl called Katrina Thomas had connected a fully loaded A4 lever-arch file across the side of her head from behind. Lara never did find out what had made Katrina fly off the handle, but her head had rung for a week solid, and the highschool physiotherapist had needed to work some magic on her neck over several sessions to quell the pains. Katrina Thomas though, Lara recalled, had nursed a nasty black eye for the next three weeks, and had also seen six months worth of physics notes sail out the seventh storey window of the science building. She chuckled at the memories, and immediately found that laughing was a bad idea, as several more pains immediately speared through her ribcage with the movement.

Lara took stock as she schooled her mind back to crystalline calm. It appeared that nobody had yet come looking for her, which was a good sign. She could see the underside of a cloudbank bathed in earthy red hues up through the trees, which signalled the approaching dusk. She was thoroughly wet, and covered in a flint-edged sand grit that stuck and itched her skin like the blazes. Her backpack was long gone, and her gun holsters empty, courtesy of the thugs Elissa and Muffai. Lara knew that darkness would come quickly in the rainforest, and that her all-too-brief attire would leave her vulnerable to the zillions of mosquitoes preparing to launch themselves into the night.

After her dive over the cliff, Lara had expertly, but narrowly, hit the riverpool at the bottom. She'd then removed her top and had begun giving it a thrashing over the sharp rocks she'd found at the base of the waterfall, before dabbing it across some of her own escaping blood. Then, she'd draped the sorry-looking result around a spindly sapling that struggled up through the shallows, taking care to picture it like a natural snag rather than an obvious placement. By her standards, it was a thin and all-too-hasty ruse, but seeing as she'd only had the clothes on her back to work with at the time, it was the best she could come up with that was anywhere close to convincing. She could only hope it had been convincing enough.

After a few extra moments sitting contemplating the sunset, Lara gingerly stood and tested her legs. Gently bouncing from side to side, she found them mostly whole, but threatened a hot bath and massage the very instant she returned to civilisation. She stretched and arched her back in her now familiar routine, again doing her best to ignore the jolts from stressed muscle and bruised flesh. Her ponytail hung wet and limp, and filled with a collection of forest floor detritus. She was indeed battered and bruised, but - she was very much alive.

Running her lengthy ponytail through her hands to bleed the water from it, Lara entered the dense thickets of the rainforest beside the river. She became driven, and, from where the late-afternoon sun hung in the sky, she knew that her Bell Jet Ranger helicopter lay somewhere to the south of her. Her flick knife had survived, secreted in the side of her left boot, and she used it to cut free a sizable stick that she used as a weapon to beat back the tangles of ferns and vines that marred her path. After a time, her world became a procession of hacks and slashes that soon had her own sweat mixing with the river water, and conspiring to keep her eternally wet. Lara hardly noticed however, and remained utterly focussed.

Working her way to the top of a low ridge that had a steep drop-off on the other side, Lara sought to gain further bearings and landmarks by seeking a view from higher ground. The trees were relentless however, and so she set about the task of climbing a tall Kapok tree that overhung the drop-off, and which she suspected might afford her a workable scene of the surrounding terrain. Her efforts produced dividends, and with the gaze of a huntress she noted the massive cliffs that had spat her out earlier lay dark and looming off to her left, but, almost lost in the gathering gloom at two o'clock, sat a taller series of rugged hills. On her flightpath into the area, Lara had approached from another direction, and of course from above. But nonetheless, three peaks sat a little disjointed from the rest, their rugged and rocky tops free of tall timber. Recognition sparked.

Lara drove herself as if inside a dream, her athletic legs soon beginning a systematic series of protests as she ruthlessly pushed herself through the unforgiving terrain. She wished vehemently for her machete, but it was gone, so her stick thrummed through the night air with a vengeance as her shoulders flexed, strained, and worked overtime with the effort of hacking undergrowth aside so she could pass. Sometimes she skirted around impenetrable masses as she came upon them, sometimes she ploughed straight through where she judged herself able. As the dusk became night, mosquitoes targeted her bare midriff, arms, and legs, as she'd feared, seeming to have an unquenchable thirst for her blood. However, when she happened upon a large termite mound rising up through the undergrowth, her mind harked back to something an old ex-soldier had once told her in a classy bar on the beaches of India: Termites produced loads of formic acid, and their termite mounds were riddled with the stuff. People in the know could rub themselves down with the earth that surrounded a termite mound for a very simple mosquito repellent, the smells of the formic acid keeping the mosquitoes at bay. Lara smiled as she covered herself in the sticky earth, not exactly Estee Lauder, she thought, but certainly the next best thing. She wondered idly what the expressions of the high-society ladies of London might be, had she there and then blundered into a dance hall, or garden gathering, and come face to face with the host. The thought produced a contemptuous laugh, before she whirled away into the night and was gone.

An hour passed, and Lara knew she must be somewhere close to the pinpoint she'd marked upon the mental map in her mind. It was no use blundering on through the night if she couldn't be more-or-less confident of a heading, or her approximate location in relation to her Jet Ranger. The glow on the horizon from the retreating sun had vanished, making it all but impossible to occasionally glimpse her landmarks through a lucky angle in the trees. She could still make out the massive cliffs to her left, their ultimate-black mass impossible to miss to her now night-tuned eyesight.

For still another hour she battled onward, directed solely by a dead reckoning she'd formulated in her mind, a bad idea she knew all too well, but the thought of long-ago friends suffering at the hands of murderers like Elissa and Muffai made the dangerous gamble seem no more than petty.

Shoving razorblade palm fronds aside with the stick, Lara suddenly found herself smiling a sultry and self-satisfied smile. The thrumming gloom of the rainforest night had opened into a small clearing, all but hidden, to reveal the tangle-free confines of a thin forest trail. She knelt in the darkness and ran her hands across the earth, making her ponytail curtain forward, and not noticing the rail of crimson blood seeping from a clean cut across her right bicep. Her fingers trailed through the accumulated dirt and leaf litter a moment before she halted the process, and nodded slowly.

During the past few days, before her adventures underground, Lara had come across an ancient network of pathways within this area of the rainforest. Some had been left to ruin, and were crumbled shadows of their former selves, lost within the ever-changing landscape. However, some still remained. Although they were mostly broken apart, and their original paving stones lay mainly buried and scattered, those skilled enough could still follow the ancient routes. Lara's fingertips danced and pattered across an old paving stone buried beneath the detritus; she'd already seen a thousand, and needed no visual confirmation to know she'd found one of the old trails.

Time was of the essence. Lara knew with painful certainty that because she now lay dead in the minds of her enemies, the hostages they'd taken to leverage her under their control would now no longer be needed. She remembered Seheira Sahain. They'd been schoolgirls together at St Marciana's college of Aylesbury in their teenage years, nearly being inseparable for much of that time. The plane crash had been the thin end of the wedge that had somehow begun drifting them apart. Seheira had always been fiercely intelligent, and had gone on to study clinical psychology at no less than Oxford. Lara had studied under several private tutors at various locations around the world, but had still kept up the occasional contact with Seheira when she'd returned home. They were different people now, their paths having taken wildly different courses through the intervening years. Lara found herself wondering what her old schoolfriend would think if she ever saw the person that Lara had become. Lara knew there was a certain darkness that lay inside her, driving her onward toward a clouded fate. Only God knew what that fate would be.

Lara brushed her hands across her tattered shorts to remove the forest floor grit, before whirling around to take up an easy jog toward the dark cliffs in the distance, running the thin line through the forest that the trail afforded. She banished the terrible thoughts of torture from her mind and focussed on the task at hand, yet the thought of her friends suffering cold and insidious murder drove and pushed her onward without mercy, the thoughts refusing to vanish completely.

The trail increased Lara's progress tenfold, its easy undulations and winding turns a mere shade of the difficulty the virgin rainforest presented, and within another half hour Lara found herself staring at a jumbled mass of gargantuan boulders at the base of one of the three peaks she'd spied earlier. She skirted around the base of the peak awhile, following the trail as it too circled the peak, before striking out across an easier section of the boulders that sloped upward toward the cliffs. The steep mountainside was relatively free of tall trees, allowing Lara to look up into the night sky unhindered. The moon had appeared through a jumbled gathering of grey voluminous clouds that rapidly slid across the sky, and served somewhat to light her path.

Lara fell into a methodical trance of climbing, balancing, sliding, and willing herself across and over the field of massive boulders. It was sheer draining work, but tough was Lara's life, and she willed the fatigue away. She came under the dark shadow of a near-vertical cliff face and again skirted along its base awhile until she found a cleft in the rock she knew to be there. She knew this peak. She knew it had a flat top, and if you had the crazy inclination – you could even park a helicopter up there.

Through the murky dark, Lara found the climbing rope she'd used days earlier to descend from the peak. Throwing caution to the wind, she began a process of using her legs to brace her body within the cleft, and slowly worked her way upward with an additional series of climbers' grips to aid her progress. When no handholds could be found, or the situation became precarious, Lara turned to the climbing rope to keep herself steady and edging upward. It was tough work, but speedier than any other technique she had to hand. Danger be damned, she thought, she had more pressing matters too close at hand. Her muscles became corded with the strain; her entire body became taut as she kept herself focussed on the ascent. One slip or loss of concentration could easily see her plummet to her death; not a prospect she particularly enjoyed thinking about. Neither was the likelihood that anyone would stumble across her broken body this deep into the Amazon; exactly zero by her reckoning.

All thoughts of failure were ruthlessly strangled as Lara pitted her strength of will against the cliff. She lost track of time, a kaleidoscope of stars and a crescent moon seeming to edge her onward, and even the tropical rain had held off for the last few hours. When the top of the cliff eventually came into view, and the darkened tree canopy lay far below, Lara allowed herself a moment of tired satisfaction. Her hard fought exertions were again beginning to pay dividends. She couldn't help but grin a little.

With a final animal-edged feminine grunt, Lara girl-handled herself over the cliff's precipice and onto the platform atop the mountain. For a moment she lay there with her lioness' heart thumping inside her chest as it rose and fell with recuperative breath. The wind whipped at her loose hair as she lay in the moonlight-darkness, staring upward into the heavenly host of coloured pinpoint light clusters that trilled in the night sky above. Idly she wondered how many human eyes had done exactly the same since time on earth began, too many to count no doubt. She slowly turned her head aside to view the Jet Ranger helicopter that she hoped to seven blue hells would still be there.

And there it was, it's aquamarine fuselage seeming to glow a little in the mystic moonlight. She stood and smiled as if to greet an old friend – but as she stepped closer the smile faded. Something wasn't right. Lara's expression became that of a thwarted panther as she grimly noted the shattered windscreen. The unmistakeable smells of aviation fuel then drifted across her senses as well, and Lara, stepping still closer, shifted her gaze to take in the swiss-cheese remainder of her Bell Jet Ranger helicopter. With a deep exasperated feeling of defeat, Lara bent down to pick up one of a thousand automatic rifle shells that littered the ground at her feet. Anger flared within her. Her helicopter had been shot to hell – and back for good measure.

The smoky gunpowder smells of the shell casing were fresh, and fuel still dribbled down along the side of the Jet Ranger's fuselage, and dripped to the rocky platform beneath. The deed had been done recently to Lara's reckoning, perhaps no more than hours past at most. She threw the casing to the ground with disgust.

"Damn typical luck Lara," she muttered to herself.

Inspecting the interior of the helicopter, Lara found the carnage no less complete. Aviation fuel covered everything, and the nav computer and radio's were hell-strewn history, and Lara dared not try any of the lights fearing an errant spark could excite the aviation fuel a little too much. She gingerly climbed into the rear cargo space and rummaged through the chaos. Most of her supplies were either gone or so filled with holes they were basically useless. Her maps were confetti, her food crates battered beyond recognition, and her spare backpack more tattered than she was. Nevertheless, she reached inside it for some spare clothes. Her spare tactical shorts were in worse condition than those she already wore, so she tossed them aside. Her spare camouflage midriff top wasn't much better, but wearable, so she slid it over her grimy torso and cut away some annoying tatters with her flick knife. The tight material sported a collection of bullet holes that would make the fashionista's of London blush, but Lara decided the look was definitely her. Just a little extra air-conditioning, she thought with a wry smile.

Moving forward, Lara grinned devilishly as she fished up underneath the Pilot's seat and felt her secreted box of tricks still in place. Ever the careful adventurer, Lara had always left nothing to chance, and always took the time to stash a few extra items in the most unlikely of places. The cushioning of the seat had saved the plastic box from the lion's share of the destruction, however a few bullet slugs had still found their mark. Her spare Globalstar satellite phone had suffered a smashed screen, but still powered up, which was good news. A battered and well-used Heckler & Koch pistol also sat in the box, along with four spare clips. Again, Lara grinned. She lifted the pistol out and noted the new gouge across the metallic grip, courtesy of her attackers. The faithful old pistol was otherwise undamaged however, and it was certainly one old friend that Lara was glad to see had survived. Shame, she thought, that it's twin was buried deeply somewhere beneath the burning sands of Egypt. The pistol pair had been her first, and both had seen a lot of action and had the scars to prove it, but now this particular one served backup duty.

Raking her curtain of hair aside as it fell forward, Lara continued her inspection. Also in the box was a medical kit, which appeared mostly intact. The last thing, or two things in actual fact, and at the moment the most important, was a double round of English honeyed ham with tomato, onion, and mushroom sandwiches – which disappeared inside a minute.

It was then that her Globalstar chimed with a hard rock tune that Winston had jokingly programmed into it one night after a half bottle of Veuve Clicquot. A band called Halestorm apparently, with a throaty female singer trying to blast the phone's speaker apart. Lara jumped at the sudden noise, her composure edgy at finding her transport ruined, and her situation no better improved. She tapped the phone's answer key.

"Hello?" she enquired with polite intrigue.

"Lara!" The voice nearly pipped that of the rock singer; such was its urgency. "God's be praised! Where are you? Are you all right? What on earth is going on?"

"Thonapa!" Lara replied, recognising the old man's voice. "Nice of you to drop me a line. Somebody shot up my helicopter, and it turns out your son is a traitor. He and his murdering new friends tried to kill me. Weather has turned nice though."

Silence a moment, before, "I know."

"Tezra knows what you know Thonapa, about Scholar Capac, and the Lithillium, and it's capabilities."

"I know."

"Cortez now knows everything, you'd have to say."

"I know."

"They have hostages Thonapa – that they'll probably want to be rid of now that they think I'm dead. They're my friends."

"Wait a minute," Thonapa replied quickly, "They think you're dead? Are you sure? How did you manage that?"

"I jumped off a cliff."

"You jumped off a – but how on earth did you – oh never mind." Thonapa stuttered in reply, wholly unsure how such a thing could be achieved. "So," he then added slowly after a pause, letting his voice trail off as he processed events. "You've worked your way back to your helicopter – ahh yes I see your heat signature there – and you've found it shot to pieces?"

"An utter garbage tip," Lara confessed darkly. "Probably an extra insurance policy against the unlikely event I survived my fall onto the rocks."

"I'm sorry Lara," Thonapa sighed in utter defeat. "None of this was supposed to happen. Tezra's defection has cut me deeply. Cortez has obviously gotten to him and filled his head with lies."

Loaded sorrowful silence then extended a few moments as Lara began to turn the cogs within her mind. "Thonapa?" she then queried across the airwaves.

"I'm here."

"This connection is secure right?"

"Like Fort Knox."

"Do you know where Tezra and his thugs are holding my friends hostage?"

Thonapa exhaled a please-don't-go-there breath. "The only place it could be is an airfield Cortez owns about thirty miles from where you are now. It isn't marked on any map. Cortez has more control over the Brazilian Government than anybody likes to admit. Ask any government official, and that airfield simply doesn't exist. It's got to be where he's holding them."

"Right," Lara replied with a glass edge in her voice. "Cortez was going to torture them in front of me if I didn't help him find Scholar Capac's trail. _Sick Bastard_." Lara fuelled venom into those last words. "I need you to get me there."

"You'll get yourself killed Lara. An army of well-paid thugs with trigger-happy fingers surrounds the airfield in any case, plus there's no way I can get any transport to you inside of three days. And I'll bet you aren't in any condition to hike through thirty miles of jungle."

"There's _got_ to be a way Thonapa!" Lara shot back at him.

More silence, a lengthy break this time, before, "OK listen."

"Listening." Lara was impatient.

"There's a river about two miles from you. It's your only hope. Make some sort of boat, if you can, and use it to navigate the river. Eventually, you'll turn left into a much larger river which goes right past Cortez' airfield. It's one _hell _of a gamble though Lara, and I can't help you."

"Sounds like a plan to me," Lara replied, her crystalline thoughts already distantly working through the problem.

"I can't talk you out of this can I Lara?" Thonapa almost pleaded. "Do you really think you can make it through" – a short pause as he checked – " thirty-five point eight miles of thick Amazon jungle, on an uncharted river that nobody knows about?"

Lara smiled pantheresque from the confines of her ruined helicopter. "Never say never until the Devil is done Thonapa."


	19. The Long White Beach

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**What's going down Tomb Raider Fans? **

******Phew! I've been through the wringer in the last few months. Something which I wouldn't wish upon anybody. Well - there's one guy in Bloomfield U.S.A who can go to hell.**

******So I found this chapter really difficult to get out there. When your life falls apart around you it's amazing the frame of mind you can get into. For a long, long time I just didn't give a damn about much at all. I just couldn't. Tried writing little bits here and there but it just didn't happen the way I wanted it to. As is the case with so many of the chapters I write, it's just got to be time now to let this sequence settle for a while and have it fade from my head.**

******What's going on people! I thought I'd be at least page 3 on the list of Tomb Raider stories by now! Don't tell me everybody else has suffered a stinging kick in the stomach as well?**

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**The Long White Beach  
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******The Deep Amazon  
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**Sunset's eyes** blazed with epic hate, her black eyebrows moulding her face into no less than pure chiselled evil. The blackness of the monster within her chilled the air about her as if invaded by the screaming tormented souls of the tortured dead. She regarded her prisoners with mockery and contempt, ruthlessly considering their lives now wholly worthless. Her blood-red mindress seemed fluid in the light as she moved, stalking about her prey, wondering at the manner in which she could bring about their deaths.

Forde's head rocketed sideward as the demon-riddled woman unleashed her umpteenth power blow against him with a blooded granite-hard fist. Thickly, he wondered how such a beautiful woman could be capable of such a feat, but the demonic bent in her fire-yellow eye's soon had the question answered. She was possessed, by the depths of the damned. Silently she stalked, and bent her face down to a level with his, grinning hellishly. His eyes followed hers.

"I'm disappointed Forde," she said in lilting luscious tones. "I thought you were more concrete than this. Pity…" She straightened and fixed him with an amused expression of evil murder.

Forde heard the words through a syrupy haze of hurt and pain, and regarded her through swollen and slitted eyelids. "Sorry," he said with his best air of cocksure bravado. "I only indulge women _without_ the fucking Devil inside them." His lips turned to a sly grin, despite the pain.

A lightening and threat-loaded backhander hit his jawline for his efforts, like a freight train loaded with rusting hulks. But Forde, despite his beaten appearance, had expected the move and rolled with the punch, timing the evasive move with near perfection. Surviving torture, he knew, was a fine line between play-acting and getting hammered to death. He wasn't as far gone as those in the room believed, hopefully Cortez included, but his mind was getting slower with each concrete hammer blow, and he knew it.

Cortez, through the lithe body of Sunset, paused after the blow and bought his puppet's blooded fist to her mouth to slowly lick and taste the blood. Forde regarded the antics with a strange detached interest. No accounting the sick tastes of some people, he thought absently. "You are an enigma to me Mr Forde," Cortez said after licking clean Sunsets reddened fists. "You are seconds away from death yet still you taunt me with useless humour. What can you possibly hope to gain from keeping up this false front of hope?"

Forde grinned again. "If nothing else - serious kudos with the angels of heaven for giving you a hard time. Gotta be worth something with the man upstairs right? Who knows, I might even get a tab at the bar near the pearly gates…"

Despite her fear, Seheira couldn't help but crack the smallest of smiles at Forde's antics. She stood in a small iron-barred alcove that had become her and Stan's prison, and peered out at the proceedings with tears in her eyes, hate in her head for Cortez, and a connection with Forde that seemed to grow by the minute. She wanted desperately to call out to him and caution against provoking the madman further, but knew all too well that he was keeping Cortez focussed on him so as to save _her_ from the same fate. _Damn the man_, she thought with a bitter smile.

Cortez had Forde strapped into a rough wooden chair, and was doing his demonic best to remove every pint of blood the man possessed. She seethed with hate for the unseen monster that was Cortez, and worried for the strange helpless woman that was his puppet. But there was nothing she could do, she didn't even know why Cortez was torturing Forde. It just seemed like a gross indulgence in a sick fantasy to her.

Cortez ran Sunset's hands over the curves of her own body with desire as he looked Forde over with no more than a mild interest, but then said "You realise that once I control the world's Lithillium resources I could well be the most powerful man alive."

Forde jerked his lolling head upward at the sudden change in conversation, and fixed a morbidly piqued interest on the man behind the woman. "Good for you," he said almost good-naturedly. "But what the hell is Lithillium?"

Sunset smiled a smile that only a madman could manifest, before taking up another wooden chair sitting nearby and plonking it down in front of Forde with the backrest facing him. She then straddled the chair with her long toned legs and crossed her athletic arms over the backrest. She fixed Forde with a sultry murderous smile. "Ain't that the question Mr Forde?" she replied.

Locking eyes again with Sunset and Cortez, Forde said, " I'm all ears."

"Lithillium," Cortez explained with an air of why-the-hell-not, "is an extremely rare metal that was discovered by the ancient Inca sometime around the late 1400's." Sunset waved her wrists languidly as she spoke. "In the ancient city of Cuzco at that time, there existed an organisation of gifted scholars who studied the metal and its properties in great detail. They soon discovered that combining the Lithillium with a blue coloured crystal, often occurring naturally in-situ with the metal, appeared to produce almost unheard of results – for the time in any case. They found that simply varying the ratio of crystal to metal, or by combining the two in different patterns, they could obtain vastly different results. Indeed, a conquistador army was literally stopped in its tracks one fine morning when one of the scholars chose to unleash the power of the metal upon them. They were my forbears incidentally."

Forde's mood darkened as recognition struck. "So you're hell-bent on gaining the worlds resources of this 'Lithillium' – and the blue crystal – for yourself, so you can realise your dream of becoming a world player?"

Sunset flexed her exquisite fists before Forde's eyes, Cortez no doubt admiring them from afar also. "Oh much more than just a world player Mr Forde," he said somewhat absently. "You see, I've already begun limiting key energy stocks into the most influential regions of the world. Two Natural Gas tankers should be sitting on the bottom of the ocean in the South Pacific by now as it happens. The British government tried to sneak them past me on the sly but " – he smiled to himself – "I took care of that little effort away from the world's prying eyes. Soon the world will have no choice but to respect me."

"And come running to you in a panic when the lights go out?" Forde replied caustically.

"Just so Mr Forde," Cortez nodded all too casually in reply. "A simple plan I know, but effective you have to admit."

"You're crazy if you think it's going to be as easy as that," Forde challenged. "As soon as the cat's out of the bag every government on the planet will turn against you and throw you back down like a sack of potatoes. Your _sick_ plans will go nowhere."

Sunset tut-tutted with a sly waggling finger. "_You_, Mr Forde," she lilted with soft menace, "are crazy if you think _that's_ all I've got up my sleeve."

Forde's eye's blazed. "Do tell…" he said deadpan.

Sunset gently shook her head with a luscious expression that spoke voluminous plenty, her deep red hair falling across her eyes to partly hide them. "Another time Mr Forde. I grow tired of this conversation." Sunset stood and arched her back as if showing off to a gathered crowd, her expression seeming lost within herself.

Forde stole a glance across to Seheira who'd been watching the exchange from their prison cell, and quietly shook his head in utter distaste of Cortez' antics. Seheira discreetly pointed at Sunset and mouthed the words '_He's mad'_ back to him. Forde could only produce the barest of nods in agreeance.

From within a well of closed eyes indulgence, Cortez said, "Both of you are now my slaves to do with as I please. I suggest you both make me happy. With Lara dead, you two are pretty much dead to the world. I am your world now."

"Lara is hard to kill you _pathetic bastard_," Forde said matter-of-factly. "She's been 'dead' before you know. My take is she got the slip on your thugheads and is on her way here right now to return the favour."

Cortez froze, and shot angered catlike eyes Forde's way. "What makes you think that my petty slave? A vain pathetic hope?"

Forde shot back his best do-your-worst grin, despite knowing full well what the consequence would be. "Because I know her, and _you_ – you crazy maniac – you _don't_. She's one girl you _don't _want to piss off."

"I admire your faith Mr Forde," Cortez replied stonily. "But I'm afraid it is drastically ill-placed."

No sooner had the words been spoken, than Sunset sprang like a supercharged viper and hammered a thunderous blow into Forde's midsection, forcing all air from his lungs with an explosion of pain. Seheira looked away wracked by helplessness and fear. She could not bear to watch the barbarity being played out beyond the iron bars of her cell. She cursed her inability to do a single thing to help – knowing the mad Cortez would not listen to reason or pause to consider any bargain. She knew, without a single doubt, that Cortez had been lost to madness for far too long to consider any course of sane action. Barbarity, anger, lust, and power were his ways now. She could only hope that Lara was indeed somewhere out beyond the walls of her cell, alive, and hell bent on rescue. A crazy thought, she admitted. The Amazon was truly vast, and Lara could be caught up in any part of it, alive or dead.

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**The mists** of the early morning rainforest had cleared, and the tropical sun sat amid an almost crystalline cobalt sky, causing the humidity at ground level to increase tenfold. Her body glassed with sweat, Lara sat carefully perusing the banks of the river on which she travelled, which were all but lost within the sheer walls of trees and other rainforest water-plants that stretched upward in a futile attempt to reach the sky. The unnamed river was vast, and calm at this point, the water's surface a mirror, neither affected by wind nor the wiles of a flowing current. Only the occasional sunken tree or jutting rock lay silently waiting beneath the sun-drenched surface, suddenly appearing out of the tannin-stained depths to hinder her progress. Thankfully, the water level in the river appeared to be higher than usual, almost certainly due to the recent tropical storms.

Lara was bone weary, yet tantalizingly alert. It had taken her the best part of a day to reach the river that Thonapa had spoken of, and then a further hour to search out an old mining operation dump Thonapa had also spotted from his array of satellites orbiting the Earth. The dump had been a rotting eyesore on the landscape, sickening her, but she'd managed to find several large and rusty iron drums that had been cut in half for some purpose or other. It was in one of these half-drums she now sat, paddling up the murky waters of God-only-knew-what river in the Amazon, using a crude paddle she'd fashioned from a straightish stick and some round paint can lids she'd also found amid the rubble. Had it not been for the odd mix of modern man-made items she now had at her disposal, she would have appeared every inch the ancient Amazon warrior.

The half-drum was not the sturdiest craft on the planet, especially given the flesh eating fish that Lara strongly suspected lived within the water's depths, but she had quickly made peace with the ungainly craft's limitations, and was now making reasonable progress with it. She found that by keeping herself as still as possible, and by paddling mainly with her arm and shoulder strength, she could set up a reasonably solid rhythm and become easily lost inside the monotony of the motion. Adroitly, ruthlessly, she willed away the protesting fatigue that had inevitably begun hardening her muscles and eating away at her energy reserves. She gritted her teeth and thought of Forde and Seheira suffering at the hands of Cortez and his thugs, and from deep within, a wellspring of energy flowed.

Lara had been out on the river with the first subtle rays of the dawn hoping to make as much use of the day's sunlight as she could. She knew she had a long way to go, and would probably need at least another night camped on the riverbank before she could make the distance to Cortez' airfield. She cursed vehemently with panther eyes. Every second she delayed could be the second her friends gave up the fight, or succumbed to some bloody torture. Forde would be a tough nut to crack, she knew, but her old schoolfriend Seheira was another matter entirely. Lara simply didn't know Seheira anymore, at all really, and as far as she knew could be dead already.

Rounding a corner in the river, Lara was immediately bought out of her focussed thoughts by the last sight on Earth she'd ever expected to see in such a remote locale. The first thing she noticed was a pristine-white beach on the far bank of the river ahead of her, where the wily river currents had obviously chosen to dump a payload of sand. However, even more impressive was a rapidly falling apart and forlorn-looking trading post which stood high and proud on thick wooden legs over the beach and riverbank. Lara also estimated a good six to seven meters separated the present waterline from an extremely rickety-looking pier that jutted out into the river a small distance, no doubt meant for supply vessels to tie up to during the post's heyday. The rear of the old building was in the process of being slowly swallowed up by the ever-encroaching rainforest.

Intrigued by the prospect of finding something useful, Lara immediately paddled her improvised craft to the shores of what she'd inexplicably begun calling the Long White Beach. After hours crammed into the rusty drum, the chance to stretch her long athletic legs was almost heaven-sent in any case. Jumping out into the shallow water the beach afforded, Lara flexed her torso and rolled her tired shoulders, all the while studying the oddly out of place structure that now stood beside her. Her malachite-green eyes took on a mischievous sparkle as she dragged the half-drum up onto the sand and turned toward the long forgotten building.

If the trading post had ever had ladders or stairs, they had long since vanished down the ever-flowing river, or had simply disappeared into the forest. Lara took to one of the round pylon supports and began climbing, using the occasional diagonal crossbeams for additional leverage. Without too much effort Lara had soon reached the wooden landing above, and she heaved herself over onto it with a grunt of pure girlpower.

"You could have come in the front door you know," a friendly voice suddenly greeted from a deckchair no more than three meters away.

Lara immediately whirled to face the voice, stunned by the prospect that somebody might actually be at home. Her right hand immediately hovered over the pistol jammed in her tattered shorts "Who are you?" she shot back in surprise.

A man sat watching her, fully at ease in a modern folding chair, he sported an easy smile yet had the look of someone who'd seen the tougher side of life and had lived to tell the tale. Lara estimated his age certainly less than forty, thirty-five odd if she were pressed on the matter. He sat in a black shortsleeved collared shirt, Blundstone boots and khaki three-quarter length shorts. He was lean and tanned from many hours spent in the outdoors, and smiled at her with uncanny assuredness. He rose and stretched out his hand toward her.

"Been called a few names through the years," he answered. "Won't tell you what names my Ex tagged me with," he added with a grin, "but you can just call me Jacob."

A reasonable judge of character, Lara could detect nothing in the man to put her on edge. Nevertheless she was cautious. "Lara Croft," she said, reaching out to shake Jacob's offered hand with an easy embrace. She then turned her head slightly and fixed him with pensive eyes. "I didn't expect to find anybody out here in the middle of nowhere…" She left the '_what the hell are you doing here'_ part hanging.

Jacob nodded, a little perplexed himself. "And I didn't expect a beautiful woman to come paddling up the river in half an old fuel drum looking like she'd stepped straight off Bondi Beach."

Lara frowned a moment, and then looked down at herself. "Bondi Beach? What gives you…?" But she quickly realised she must look quite a sight to a stranger, dressed as she was in her rather brief attire, and her bedraggled appearance no doubt added to the enigma. Lara nodded in acquiescence. "Yeah well," she said with a slight grin of her own, "someone shot my helicopter to smithereens and I had to take a flying leap off a cliff to avoid being shot."

"Hell of a day then," Jacob replied with a single raised eyebrow. "At least you _did_ avoid getting shot" – he paused and gave her a quizzical searching look – "I think."

Again Lara washed her gaze over her collection of cuts, scrapes, and bandages. "Oh I missed the bullet," she said, eyeing a nasty bruise on her left side that had deepened in colour to nothing short of insidious black. "But I connected with every-damn-thing else imaginable because of it."

Jacob never blinked an eyelid, as if such ridiculous stories were commonplace for him. Instead he said, " Is there a chance you might be hungry and in need of a Tequila Sunrise?"

Lara nodded with a little more enthusiasm than she'd planned. Damn it to hell, she thought, but she _was_ hungry. Jacob disappeared inside the jumble of sprung boards and weather-battered window frames to search out some manner of food for her. As Lara watched him go, she caught herself peering at all the badly weathered woodwork and wondering just how much longer the old trading post could continue to defy the elements, as it had clearly already lasted long past it's prime.

The view from the warped and uneven pier was tranquillity itself. Lara stepped to the edge and peered over the river, looking out to where it disappeared around a bend further along. She began to sift events in her mind as her eyes roved the trees, and then, on autopilot, her hands again moved to her tangled ponytail, freed it, and began raking her fingers through her long hair. A number of the tresses caught and flew in the gentle breeze, but these she easily caught as if catching dragonflies from an airy summer evening.

The morning was still only half done, judging by the position of the Amazonian sun across the sky. Lara knew she couldn't tarry at the trading post for too long, the stakes were too high and her time was too precious to waste. The presence of Jacob was an intriguing enigma and raised a raft of questions, but at this point Lara could use all the help she could get. The question of course, was would he help her at all?

Lara turned at the noise of another deck chair being plonked on the wooden decking behind her.

"Hope you like basic ham and salad sandwiches?" Jacob asked.

"Does the Pope have a balcony?" Lara replied, her hunger pangs rising instantly to new levels.

Lara sat, fanned her hair over the back of the chair, and attacked the sandwiches with gusto. Jacob moved his chair next to her and sipped what Lara guessed had to be a Tequila Sunrise of his own. Between mouthfuls, Lara voiced the obvious question.

"So you're a hermit with a passion for old trading posts?"

Jacob smiled, but it was shot through with an indescribable pain, or sorrow. "The Brazilian Government had this job going," he explained. "It appears that nobody has a clue about what infrastructure lies hidden on the banks of the rivers and waterways in the Amazon Basin. This old post for example" – he turned and motioned toward it – "was built by a company called Zontax Trading. Seems they supplied the mining operations near here back in the 70's and also stocked quite a range of gear for fishermen and hunters. After that a drug cartel moved in and used it as an out of the way warehouse for their wares."

"How nice," quipped Lara with a sour look.

Jacob nodded a sarcastic agreement. "That's probably when all knowledge of it mysteriously 'disappeared' from any map or from people's memories. But now there's always expeditions needing to go places here, to set up medical stations in villages, explore for minerals, or just plain go fishing, and they're always asking if there's anyplace out here they can use – for anything. So the government gave me a boat, filled me up with supples, and pointed me toward the horizon. Said I shouldn't come back until I'd made a decent inventory – or ran out of food." He looked out across the river and became wistful. "Suits me."

Lara's interest piqued, suspecting there was more. "You came into the Amazon Basin all by yourself? Bit rash isn't it?"

"I'm running Lara, I suppose," Jacob replied in grim assessment. "Not so long ago I was on the precipice of marriage, and I was the happiest man in the world. But that all came crashing down like a shot and burning spitfire." Those last words held sad bitterness.

"Marriage wasn't for her?" Lara carefully asked, turning her malachite eyes upon the man, this time with a softness that hardly ever surfaced.

"Found she'd been cheating on me with a guy in the U.S. over the Internet, and with discreet phone calls late in the middle of the night. This is after I'd loved her like the God's-be-damned blazes for twelve years."

And there it was, Lara thought. She'd always found it amazing some of the stories people on the road had to tell. Jacob it seemed, was no exception. The wilderness had a habit of being the great healer when people's lives had fallen apart from underneath them. Lara had been there, after a plane crash had left her stranded in the Andes with both her parents dead. Healing always came slowly though, she knew all to well, and knew the harsh road that Jacob had yet to travel.

"Fucking Bitch," Lara voiced into the soft tropical breeze.

Jacob tore his eyes from the heavenly vista and regarded her with a spark of humour weaving across his face. "Amen to that," he said, holding up his half drained glass.

Lara smiled with genuine feeling, something she rarely did. "Now - this boat of yours," she said, changing the topic to more pressing matters.

"Ahh," Jacob grinned again. " I was wondering when we'd get to that. Your trigger happy buddies aren't so far away I take it?"

"Actually, I think they thought I met the Grim Reaper when I jumped off that cliff," Lara surmised.

Jacob sighed and regarded her with a look shot through with sympathy. "I hate to tell you this but this part of the Amazon is remoteness incarnate. The closest place to here of any significance is a good four to five days away."

Lara leaned forward, resting both elbows in her lap and her chin on one balled fist. "So what about the military-style airfield that's a few miles downstream?"

Jacob momentarily tensed, but then immediately relaxed. He clearly hadn't expected Lara to know the airfield existed. Uneasiness crept like a shadow over his easygoing nature. "You mean the one that doesn't exist?" he asked.

"That'll be the one," Lara nodded back at him with her flint-edged gaze. "Some of my friends are being tortured there – held by the thugs that tried to kill me. They might already be dead, but I have to at least _try_ and find out, and help them if possible."

Jacob was silent a moment as he processed what Lara had just told him. He ran both hands through his short and thick golden hair. "Damn," he said with an outrush of breath. "You're just full of surprises aren't you? Friends getting tortured, jumping off cliffs, avoiding bullets, turning up in the middle of nowhere full of stories…"

Lara knew what he was getting at. "It's the truth Jacob," she said with all the honesty she could muster. "My life is" – she paused to search out the right words – "different from that of other girls. What I do, the skills I have, often bring me face to face with greedy evil scum who want to steal and take what isn't theirs." She then followed Jacob's gaze out across the river. "This trip appears to be going the same way," she said resignedly.

"Just tell me you aren't some drug runner or escaped criminal dodging the law."

"If I say it," Lara said softly. "Does it make it true in your eyes?"

"That's the gamble isn't it?" Jacob said in world-weary tones. "Say it to my face and I'll believe you. But don't go thinking everybody I meet gets that privilege. I've become a not-too-shoddy judge of people these past years you know."

"What's my score then?" Lara pressed, with a hint of humour.

The corners of Jacob's mouth twisted into a subtle grin. "You'd have shot and killed me if you were badass, rifled through all my stuff for anything useful, and then just stolen my boat and made off into the sunset."

"I can see reason in that," Lara replied with an easygoing nod. "I guess you saw the pistol I've got jammed in my shorts though."

"You're not exactly covered in clothing Ms Croft," Jacob replied though a widening grin. Where else was the pistol going to go?"

Lara couldn't help but laugh a little too. "Easy tiger," she said though perfectly white teeth. "This girl's been through hell over the last few days. Gimme a break will you!"

Jacob threw up his hands in laughing supplication. "Couldn't resist!" he quickly said. Then, a calm and pensive silence descended over him, and seriousness washed across his features. "That airfield you want to get into – it's massively guarded by some pretty heavy artillery and a thousand goons with automatic rifles you realize."

"Can you get me close and drop me off?" Lara asked without missing a beat, her demeanour suddenly hardening at the change in topic.

Jacob noted Lara's sudden change in character with an internal jolt of surprise. In that moment, an inkling formed that perhaps he'd seen a side of her that few people ever got to see. She was almost dangerous to his perceptions now – as she had been the moment she'd rolled over the pier platform. He wondered momentarily how many people truly knew the Lara Croft hidden inside the woman who sat next to him now. Her beauty was undeniable, but clasped tightly around a driven woman of unrelenting and dangerous willpower. He decided there and then he was glad not to be her enemy. "Sure thing," he replied, revealing nothing of his internal musings. "I can get you within a mile or so. After that they'll start shooting."

"You mean the fun begins," Lara said pantheresque, as if carefully planning a surprise pool party.

"Lara – "

"No." Lara replied steadfast over the top of him. Then she smiled – though it was shot through with granite. "A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do," she explained simply. Lara knew that to Jacob, she must appear like a madwoman intent on getting herself killed. That might happen, she thought without so much as a blink, but she'd take down as many of those evil son's-of-bitches as she could in the meantime – which was a sentiment she didn't expect Jacob to understand.

"Ok," Jacob said with a sudden simple roguishness. "But you're stark raving mad. You know that?"

Lara laughed. "You're only about the eight-hundred-and-thirty-ninth person to tell me that."

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**They had been** on the river three hours by the time Jacob eased back on the throttles of the old wooden riverboat the Brazilian Government had loaned him. The afternoon was lengthening, but the sun still hung in the sky and blazed with an intense tropical heat. Lara had soon realised that the river she'd paddled her half-drum upon earlier in the day was no more than a minor tributary in comparison to the wide and expansive waterway they now travelled. But she knew the Amazon was vast, hiding ever-bigger rivers and ever-deeper rainforest around every turn, each valley toward the interior becoming more lost than the last.

As a precaution, Jacob had kept the revs of the boat's chugging diesel engine to a minimum, and had steered as close to the overhanging trees lining the bank as possible. Jacob somehow seemed adept at being clandestine, perhaps hinting at experiences in times past yet to be told. When a sizable gap appeared between the trees, Jacob eased the boat around and gently steered them into it, effectively making them vanish within the shadows to the casual passer-by on the river.

"The end of the line for me I'm afraid Ms Croft," Jacob announced with a somewhat worried look. "About another mile and a half up this river you'll find the goons you're looking for."

Lara nodded her thanks, her mind clearly already working through the mechanics of what she was about to do. "Thanks Jacob," she said, and then smiled. "I'll send you a postcard when I come out on the other side."

"Just send me an invite to the party when it's all over."

"Deal," Lara replied. "But where does the invite go?"

Jacob reached into a side pocket near the boat's throttle controls with a conspirationally raised eyebrow and produced a dog-eared business card. Fishing back into the pocket of tricks he produced a plastic pen, which he used to write on the back of the card. "I might check this email address two to three times a year," he said with a grin that revealed he knew that fell into the category of 'hardly ever'. Next he wrote a mobile phone number, and looked up thoughtfully. "Maybe two years ago was the last time I was in an area with phone service. But give this a try as well."

Lara looked playfully dubious. "You stay hard to track down on purpose?" she asked slyly.

"Just the way I like it," Jacob replied. "Lets just say that should I come across certain things in my old life – things would go pear shaped in a hurry. I'm better of lost out here for the time being."

Lara simply nodded in understanding. Jacob, no doubt, would tear the head off the guy that his ex-partner had chosen to cheat on him with. Somehow, Lara thought, crossing Jacob seemed like something that wouldn't end well.

The roof of the old riverboat sported a badly sun-faded red inflatable, and beside that sat a heavily repaired canoe that seemed like it used to be black, but the harsh tropical sun had wrought the colour back to somewhere around dirty-smog grey.

Jacob climbed to the roof and released a series of clips that held down the canoe. "Not the most luxurious boat on the river," he said nodding toward the canoe. "But a definite step up for you wouldn't you say."

Lara encased her arms around the weather-beaten hull of the canoe as Jacob slid it down to her, and eased it onto the deck. "It's perfect," she admitted. "Nothing worse than fluoro orange when you're trying to get the jump on bad guys."

They soon had the canoe launched and said their goodbyes, but just as Lara was about to climb into the canoe and be off, Jacob said, "Just a minute," and disappeared into the riverboat's forward cabin. He emerged a few moments later with an over-shoulder gunbelt loaded with shotgun shells, and an old Winchester pump-action shotgun. "I figure you might need this," he said with an air of solemnity.

Lara watched the faded sky-blue wheelhouse of the riverboat disappear through the mist that hung low over the river. Jacob was an odd character, she thought. Who would remove themselves so completely from the world over such a commonplace thing as a break up? She got the real impression he'd been a loner for some length of time – years at least. She took up the aluminium paddle that Jacob had given her and began paddling off in the opposite direction – but stopped as a strange feeling came over her. She looked back to where Jacob's riverboat had disappeared, still able to faintly hear the soft chugging of the diesel engine against the background thrum of the rainforest – and could have sworn the man had seemed strangely familiar to her, like she should have known him.

Perplexed at this sudden thought, Lara fished out the worse-for-wear business card that Jacob had written on, and turned it over. An image of a red Kenworth road train truck was printed there with the business name '_Irounhound Trucking_' stencilled in faded gold lettering above it. Below the image of the Kenworth was written, '_Call Jacob for all your trucking needs. No job too big or too small_.' The thought of familiarity was certainly there, but quickly became lost the more Lara tried to focus on it, until it became no more than a lightly nagging feeling. Odd, Lara thought, but then turned the canoe up the river and paid it no extra thought.

The canoe proved to be a far superior craft to the fuel drum Lara had started out with, and she quickly found that making headway was a much easier prospect with this more refined craft. The river current was slowly running with her, providing a hint of extra push with each paddlestroke, a good thing Lara thought, as she'd have to begin thinking about conserving energy for the task ahead.

The sun soon dipped below the treeline and just as it did so, the faint echoing of a hard-running outboard motor weaved its way through the tropical mire. Lara froze and listened. The motor sounded highly tuned, and produced a throaty growl that she didn't think would be attached to any riverboat such as Jacob's. More likely a river patrol of Cortez's, she reasoned. Whoever it was, they sure seemed to be in a hurry.

Lara immediately pointed the canoe into the trees hanging out over the river and began working her way into the shadows as far as was possible. The growling sounds of the approaching boat became louder more quickly than she had anticipated, the unknown vessel clearly making even more speed than she'd initially judged. Within less than a minute the boat had rounded the turn in the river ahead and was thundering toward her. Lara pulled her pistol from a storage box in front of her, twisted sideways awkwardly, and took a bead on where she thought the boat to be beyond the trees.

She froze.

Through a larger gap in the covering foliage than she would have liked, Lara spied a Vietnam War era patrol boat, sometimes called a PBR, which was short for '_Patrol Boat River'_.

"Damn," Lara swore silently to herself.

The PBR was loaded to the hilt with two mounted guns, one on top of the wheelhouse and one mounted on the rear deck, which Lara thought looked very much like the old .50 calibre M2 machine guns the U.S. Navy had fitted to some versions of the boat. Added to that, Lara counted at least five or six men with automatic weapons strewn liberally over the speeding vessel, a grim prospect against the likes of her single and well-used Heckler & Koch pistol. Jacob's shotgun would serve no use in a firefight like this.

The patrol boat neither slowed nor missed a beat however, and sped past as if concerned with wholly more pressing matters.

Lara let up the pistol.

Gung-ho goons more concerned with having a good time she reasoned, rather than conducting a proper reconnaissance of the river and all the shaded hiding spots it concealed along each bank. Probably a regular patrol that had always turned up empty in the past, so no doubt the hired soldiers aboard were thinking today would have gone exactly the same way. Likely, the men aboard would race up the river and then tie off to a tree and play dice for a few hours to use up the time. Sloppy operators, Lara realised. Her prospects of success had just gone up a notch if the same held true for the men guarding the airfield.

Nevertheless, Lara thought it best to wait an hour or two for the additional cover of darkness against the prospect the patrol boat would return. As the shadows began to lengthen and grow darker, she couldn't help but wonder if all she would find were the dead bodies, or the rough bush graves of her friends.

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	20. Nightdevil Part I

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**What's up party people! So I'm going to go out on a limb right here and say that anyone who'd been following this story had probably forgotten about it. What - with me slipping back to page 2 - and several months passing with nary a whisper. That and the fact there's a full freighter load of Tomb Raider stories to read here on FFNET to keep you occupied. A LOT has happened for me recently. Enough said. Usually I would have edited this a little more before posting, but it's been an age since I last updated, so I just went ahead and posted. I'll fix glitches... eventually :)**

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**Nightdevil  
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**Part I  
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******The Deep Amazon  
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**The shadows** of the deep forest licked at the thin, yellowed torchbeam like black fingers reaching up from the depths of the underworld. There was a crescent moon above the treetops, but only the barest slivers of moonlight filtered down to the forest floor to mix with the gloom. The thick moist air could be cut with a knife, and every creature of the night, large or small, filled the darkness with sinister sound.

Omar Kennikra found himself on edge. A superstitious man at the best of times, he disliked being thrust uselessly out into the night shadows to guard a vacant section of remote rainforest. What was the point, he asked himself for the hundredth time since the sun had disappeared some hours before? His rusting automatic rifle, he knew, would be no match for the spirits that walked the deep forest at night. He could only hope his hasty prayers would protect him.

The rainforest was never silent at night, never, and yet again Omar whipped around at a sudden noise in the sodden undergrowth and shoved his old rifle barrel into the shadows. Slowly, he aimed his equally battered torch in the same direction - and found nothing but damp earth and rotting leaf decay amid a tangle of ferns. He sighed, it had been the same every few minutes for the last hour, and he could feel himself tensioning like a wound spring with each occurrence. Flicking off the torch resignedly, he shivered as a tingle rose up his spine.

A branch crackled on forest floor off to his left and Omar spun to face the noise with a startled whimper. Those freaks weren't paying him enough for this…

Nothing. The dim light of his old torch showed nothing. He stepped cautiously toward where he thought the noise had come from, forgetting in his half-terror to step silently. Then, it was as if his worst nightmare had come true…

Suddenly there was a terrible screaming, it rose up from the depths of the shadows and assailed him full in the face, a tormented and pitiless wail. A haunted spirit had found him, and yelled vengeance for his trespass. A white, dead face flashed across his vision within an eyeblink, but was gone just as fast. Disoriented, Omar yelled his own strangled cry.

"Get back spirit! I have done nothing to you!" He furiously turned in all directions, panicked, trying vainly to search the deep dark shadows with the thin torchbeam. He saw nothing. His heart beat wildly inside him, filling his ears with its low-down thump.

Silence. The forest always went silent to let the spirits pass… He tried desperately to calm his ragged breaths.

Omar, his composure ready to shatter, his hands shaking, slowly scanned the thickets around him, not wanting anything to do with the entity for which he searched. The spirit world was not meant to mix with the living.

What happened next would haunt his dreams for the rest of his life. Suddenly the spirit was beside him, wailing it's revulsive death cry, it's ghostly-white face and penetrating gaze spearing through him like cold, frosty anger. It must have blinked into existence from the spiritworld as he passed, angered in the extreme at his trespass. Omar yelled in pure terror at the sight of the thing. He flailed wildly in the darkness, trying to beat the thing away with his useless mortal arms – all he found was air.

Then he was running. He tripped in a hollow and went sprawling and sliding, his old gun flying into the dark as he landed heavily. Hot adrenalin fuelled him on. He screamed and yelled into the night with sheer terror at the thing that chased him, seeking his life as a debt of trespass into a realm in which he didn't belong. The last thing he could remember was looking back through the darkness, and seeing the long strands of black death cascade from the thing's corpselike head.

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**Watch officer** Brennan Lonnegan peered out through the steamed windows of watch command, a small glass-windowed hut at the edge of Cortez' airfield filled with all manner of radios, security camera monitors, and a plethora of weapons and other tools of the security trade. Running off in both directions either side of the hut was a six-meter high chainlink fence capped with razor wire; William Cortez left nothing to chance when it came to protecting his assets, even amid the deserted Amazon rainforest. Powerful overhead spotlights gave a stark blue-crystal glow to the empty no-mans-land between the edge of the airfield and the thick steaming jungle, some fifty meters away. To Brennan's knowledge, nobody had ever even dared peep through the bushes at the airfield, much less attempt a siege against the army of sadistic underpaid thugs that patrolled its borders. He sighed for the hundredth time that night, only briefly glancing out at the always-empty space between the hut and the thick wall of rainforest outside.

Resigned to yet another quiet night, Lonnegan was amid pouring himself his third coffee for the evening when he heard a faint yelling pierce through the night air. Instantly setting the cup down, he swivelled and again peered out through the lightly fogged windows to the expanse outside, his weathered features setting into concern as he did so. He saw nothing, but the screaming was still there, and he recognised instantly the pure terror in the voice that yelled. He knew that some of the men were superstitious about spirits in the night and such, but never before had that caused a problem, especially when their paychecks had been boosted a modest amount.

The crashing and tearing sounds of foliage soon became apparent as - whoever it was – bolted through the jungle toward the hut with little thought for stealth. Lonnegan spoke briefly through an intercom, and was joined moments later by two massive hulking men armed to the teeth with automatic weapons.

"Some fool is coming," he said to the two men simply. "You know what to do." The newcomers nodded silently, their blonde, closely cropped flattop haircuts moving crisply in unison. They moved outside without a word and aimed their weapons at the ready. Lonnegan, nonplussed, took up his own weapon and waited beside them.

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**Lara kept pace** with the fleeing guard she'd – quite easily in the end – been able to tip over the edge of superstition into full-blooded and terrorized flight. The first guard she'd happened across had been far too cool and collected for such a tactic to work, but the second, the man she now followed, had had a much more amenable imagination. Nothing like a little superstition, she thought, to get people's adrenalin working in her own favour. Lara had little need to disguise her own movements; such was the racket the fleeing guard made as he crashed through all manner of thickets and other leafy understorey plants. She was almost certain the man must have attracted some sort of attention by now, and was grimly aware of the odds stacked against her, and knew she'd have to play the few cards she had exactly right in order to survive. It was either that, or a death without mercy.

Powerful lights appeared through the thick rainforest tangle, and Lara immediately slowed her gait to a quick stalk, letting the crazed guard crash onward toward them alone. They must have reached some of the airfields outer buildings, Lara surmised, perhaps a security post of some kind, which almost certainly meant additional guards loaded to the teeth with weapons. Her plan, she grimaced, was fluid at best, and constantly changed as events unfolded, but she was now committed and all thoughts of turning back ruthlessly evaporated.

Yelling erupted from somewhere beneath the lights, new voices that were angry and heated, easily travelling the heavy night air to where Lara was. They argued with vile passion as she made further stealthy progress toward them, trying to discern what was being said with each step, until she came across an abrupt end to the forest. Lara dropped prone hoping she hadn't been spotted, and laid still, listening.

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**Lonnegan spat** his disgust at the man standing before him. "I don't give a God's-Bejeezus-Damn what you saw!" he yelled. "You don't desert your _fucking_ post!"

Omar's eyes were wide with superstitious fear, his body trembling on the glass-edge of meltdown. "You fool!" he threw back, his voice near breaking point. "No man can stand against the spirits of the dead! We have angered them!"

Lonnegan sighed and shook his head as if dispensing tired discipline to a small child, it was clear there would be no reasoning with this crazed man. He glanced sideways to one of the flattop guards. "Just kill him," he said to the man, throwing his hands upward in an empty uncaring gesture. It wouldn't be hard to replace this stupid idiot in any case; there was a lengthy list of dirt-poor locals begging to be paid the pittance Cortez offered.

Recognition flailed Omar's face into contorted panic. "What – "

But no time existed to voice any further protest. The hulking guard Lonnegan had spoken to whipped his rifle butt across Omar's jawline, sending him sprawling backward. His momentary disorientation caused him to sway and overbalance drunkenly, saving him from a short burst of automatic fire meant to kill. Lonnegan laughed at the display, finding dark humour in the sport they had found. But as the second thug unleashed a similar burst of fire at the hapless man, things unnervingly went awry.

One second Lonnegan was laughing, the next, he was frowning at the blood appearing across the face of the blonde guard to his right. He suddenly peered uncomprehendingly as the huge man went down like a massive piece of felled lumber, his lifeless eyes staring upward into heavens. Usually composed, Lonnegan was at an instant confused loss.

_What the hell!_

He stared dumbly as the second guard went down in a similar fashion, even as the man fired his weapon at the screaming idiot who rolled across the ground in frenzied panic. The crazed man's gun had been taken from him the moment he'd arrived so – _what the hell!_

Only when something fizzed by him another instant later did sanity – and recognition return. His right calf suddenly burned white hot as he dropped prone and emptied an entire clip into the shadowed forest. Someone was out there shooting at him, but only god knew from where. In the next instant the overhead spotlights disintegrated amid a hail of return fire, plunging the whole area into a dark moonlit gloom.

Lonnegan cursed his overconfident bravado at only having bought a single clip outside the command hut with him. He immediately scrambled across the ground to the door of the hut, even as his subconscious mind noted an odd fluid movement at the corner of his vision. Things had moved too fast, and he knew with a grim bitterness that he'd been outplayed – so far. His right leg didn't allow him to stand, so he crashed noisily through the door crawling on his three good limbs, leaving behind a blood trail as he went, and made for the wall that held the gun rack.

Something ungodly appeared in the doorway, but he lashed out with his one good leg and sent his office swivel chair crashing toward the thing – whatever it was. He desperately reached for another weapon from the gun rack, but his luck had run out, and he whipped his hands away from the weapons as the rack came alive with sparks, and the room filled with gunfire.

A deathly voice then spoke through the ringing in his ears. "Don't move and don't piss me off... There's a good chap."

Lonnegan, accepting momentary defeat, looked to face the tall attacker who filled the doorframe, expecting to see a soldier, or mercenary for hire armed to the teeth. But what he saw defied belief. From the floor, he looked up into the malachite-green eyes of probably the most striking woman he had ever seen. He frowned perplexed as he noted her tattered clothing that left her midriff mostly bare, and her shorts looked as though they had been through a garbage processing works. Adding strangeness to mystery, she had covered herself entirely in a whitish slush, perhaps clay of some sort, even running it over her face and through her very long hair. She was athletic, and her eyes bored into him like laser cutters. He blinked several times at the unnerving sight of her, and the Steyr assault rifle she had trained on his chest. He found himself speechless.

_What the hell!_

The woman stalked toward him, easily hefting the office chair with a single arm, leaving the other to expertly hold the Steyr with barely a single waiver. Lonnegan might have lashed out or hurled abuse in the least, but he'd seen enough professional killers in his lifetime to know that this was a woman who deserved respect. With panther quickness, the striking woman planted the office chair over his abdomen, and then sat down on it with her combat-booted feet either side of his chest and the Steyr barrel digging into it. One glitch of her finger and he knew he was dead. He looked up into her ghostly white face, framed now by her long tresses of death-black and clay-white hair that cascaded down close enough for him to touch.

"Hello," she said with a British accent, a smile, and a truckload of warning. "I find myself in need of a little information."

"Fuck you bitch!" Lonnegan spat with all the hate he could muster. "I'll tell _you_ exactly jack sh –"

The Steyr cracked twice and Lonnegan waited for death, however all he felt was a volcanic pain erupt in his left arm. Immediately he knew he'd been shot there, and he yelled both with the sudden pain, and the indignation of being controlled by a woman.

"Jesus _Chist_ you sadistic _BITCH!"_

"Cut the crap soldier boy," she snapped, silencing him. "I don't have time for your petty games! Cortez has two hostages, a man and a blonde woman. _Where are they?_"

Lonnegan boiled over with helpless, white-hot rage, but chilled rapidly as the half-dressed woman casually reached over and took an additional Steyr from the rack close by, and levelled it inches from his nose.

"Must I ask you again?" she prompted with a suggestive voice of glacial cut glass. "Sometimes I get the jitters when I hold guns like this."

Disgusted with himself, Brennan Lonnegan stared into the business end of the assault rifle, and suddenly it came to him that he simply wasn't paid enough for this crap.

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**Seheira looked** through the bars into the gloom of the cavern. It was night outside, she guessed, by the fact that they'd only been left with one brute soldier standing outside their cell guarding them, and the fact that all other activity in the cavern had gone quiet. They had been prisoners for two days, as best she could tell, and thankfully Cortez had not visited them again since their first arrival. Forde, looking as though he'd fallen off a cliff – and then gone back for round two, slept soundly on the stone floor beside her. He had endured Cortez' sick torture without giving away a squeak, infuriating the macabre man behind his strange but beautiful puppet host. Eventually, it appeared that Cortez had lost his 'connection' with his host, as Sunset had suddenly gone limp and slumped to the floor. Lucky for Forde, she thought, just another few minutes and things could have been very different.

Sleep simply would not come, and Seheira lay on the floor next to Forde staring up into space. She couldn't help but worry about what their captors had in store for them next, nothing good she mused silently. The way Cortez had leered at her with sick delight had left her in no doubt that what he had in store for her didn't ever bear thinking about. It would be horrible, painful, and a fate worse than death. She only hoped that death would find her quickly if things ended up going that way.

Suddenly the lights blinked into life, throwing back the shadows and illuminating the cavern into stark brilliance. Footsteps began to echo from the stairwell directly opposite them, it appeared her and Forde's all too brief time of respite was over. Fully awake in any case, Seheira sat up and gave Forde a gentle shove.

Forde's bone weary voice replied, "Huh? What is it?"

"It's the breakfast committee," Seheira replied.

Forde's eyes bolted open. "Oh joy," he bemoaned. "Do you think we'll get champagne with our morning meal?'

"I doubt it. Just another serve of bruises and sadistic barbarism if previous experience is anything to go by."

Forde grinned. "I knew we should have chosen the place next door."

"Ahhhhhh," Seheira sighed, "you mean the place that actually isn't a prison run by a psychopathic maniac and an army of bloodthirsty goons?"

" That's the place," Forde admitted, wincing as he sat up also. "Though "I'm sorely tempted to blow this place altoghether, the beds here are terrible."

Seheira smiled. "You make me laugh Forde…" But their moment ended when the hulking form of Elissa strode through the doorway followed by several bandits who appeared peeved to the nines. Within moments the frightening woman was standing outside their cell barking orders.

"Get the prisoners out of there, they have work to do!"

The bandits swiftly obeyed, and without a word the cell door was unlocked and Sheheira and Forde were roughly shoved out of the cell to stand before Elissa. She smirked at them both with nothing short of cruel menace. "I hope the both of you slept well," she said, almost overjoyed with the fact there was no way on earth they could have.

Seheira merely nodded, not wanting to spark the unpredictable woman into a rage. Forde shrugged and said, "It wasn't bad actually."

Elissa nodded. "Oh good," she replied, her smirk widening, before turning to the bandit standing immediately beside her. "Give them a morning working over will you Samood," she said to him almost conversationally, "it seems our guests have gotten a little too comfortable." The man nodded with a sudden menacing grin, this was one job he would enjoy very much.

"What!" Seheira blurted. "What do you mean 'working over'?"

Forde was grim faced as Samood placed his automatic rifle on the floor and took off his shirt. "She's wants soldier boy here to rough us up a little." He immediately looked at her. "Get behind me," he said.

Elissa chuckled. "My my, aren't you quite the gentleman Mr Forde? But unfortunately for you, Samood is well versed in hand-to-hand combat. There's no need to worry though, you'll just be getting a few extra bruises and pains. Like I said, there's work for you Ms Sahain to do afterward."

"Wouldn't we work better uninjured?" Seheira voiced as she slowly backpedalled.

"Perhaps," Elissa replied. "But sometimes a little pain and suffering has quite the opposite effect. Trust me, I'm not new at this." She then paid them no further attention as Samood slowly paced forward with fists raised.

He came on with methodical manner, his eyes flicking between his two victims with rapid intensity. He quickly lunged, and laughed with delight as Forde flinched backward. Forde knew there was no way he could hold the man off for long, and with Elissa watching there was no way either he or Seheira would escape without at least a few decent hits.

Elissa's words proved prophetic, as Forde, exhausted, never saw Samood's first punch arrive seemingly from thin air. Two hits had slammed him before pure instinct barely swept the third aside. Samood didn't stop there however, and suddenly Forde's legs had been swept out from underneath him, making him to fall to the floor in a pummelled heap. Samood cackled like a madman, and turned his attention to Seheira.

Again he slowly stepped toward her with fists raised, and was mildly surprised when she met his gaze with defiance. She was a beautiful woman he thought, it would be a shame to spoil her face, but then, the idea had a certain appeal to him.

Seheira watched him come as if outside herself, she flipped her long hair over her shoulder wishing she had something to tie it with. The room was a jumble of ancient artefacts piled high in the centre, with other odds and ends strewn around randomly. She was aware of Forde yelling, and the corner of her vision revealed him being held by two other bandits, and Elissa looking on with pure evil lust in her eyes.

Samood rushed her with sudden speed, but Seheira darted sideward and sprinted across the room with a speed that clearly surprised the bandit. Arriving near the artefact pile Seheira scooped up a wooden shaft that she had spied moments earlier. The moment she hat the artefact in her hands she found Samood within spitting distance, and swung the shaft with every ounce of strength she possessed. Samood uttered a sudden "UFF!" and slid suddenly to the floor beneath the shaft's swinging arc, making Seheira connect with nothing more than thin ether. The bandit was like a whirlwind, and was on his feet again within seconds, grinning at her with pure delight. But his was the mistake, because Seheira had simply followed though on her swing roundhouse fashion, and had gained even more speed and force as the shaft came around again. Too late Samood realised what she done, and hot fury shot through him like a bullet as his eyes saw the shaft end arrive within his vision once more, before his world went black.

All in the room could hear a sickening crunch as Samood dropped to the floor like a sack of limp fish; he'd been knocked cold, and would have a nasty gash for weeks to come. Seheira's heart pumped loudly, seeming to roar in her mind. She stood rooted to the spot, part of her mind still catching up with events. She immediately looked toward Elissa with fear, knowing there would be sure retribution.

Nobody in the cavern spoke as Elissa stood with brooding silence. Forde looked at her with mouth agape, not quite believing Seheira could have packed such a punch. Moments slipped away in stalemate, before Elissa spoke with the cruellest voice Seheira had ever heard. "That really _wasn't_ a very good idea Ms Sahain."

The huge woman stepped toward her.

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	21. Nightdevil Part II

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**Okay! Yes... Okay! I'm completely in the doghouse! To everybody who said "Where are you?" I thank you for spurring me onward. You are all right of course, we've come too far to simply drop Lara, Seheira, and Stanley Forde in the middle of the Amazon with their fates hanging on the knife's edge of doom. How can I leave them to simply fade from your minds with their stories left untold? To come so far and to go no further? BOLLOCKS TO THAT! This little story ain't done! So long have I been writing it, and so much water has flowed under that bridge since I typed that first word, seemingly 100 years ago, that to give up now would be a pure cop out. What say you!**

**I wrote this over the intervening months since my last update. Some of it worked several times over and some a complete gem right off the bat. Welllllll... you be the judge!  
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**Don't even think about asking me how close to the end we are. Not that close if I were pressured for an answer. I have a theory we'll be here for little while yet. Just a theory though... :)  
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**EDITS: Had to tweak a sequence that was a bit lame involving Stan Forde. Un-Lamed it!  
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***14***

**Nightdevil  
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**Part II  
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**Seheira went cold**, as if the raging demons of hell had all walked across her grave at once. The dire retribution held inside the eyes of the woman who now approached her left no question about Seheira's imminent fate. Samood lay unmoving several meters away, and it seemed to Seheira that she'd done no more than keep herself breathing for a few extra minutes at best. Slowly she backed away as Elissa stalked her with deadly intent.

Forde struggled mightily, but remained clamped immobile by the two thugs that held him.

The wooden staff Seheira held in her hands had a little weight to it, but it suddenly seemed insignificant in the face of her current threat, and she wondered whether the likes of a freight train would fare much better against Elissa. She scanned the room for other alternatives, or anything else that could aid her, but came up with nothing. All she could do was try and avoid Elissa for as long as possible, or perhaps try and negotiate. "You had some work in mind for us didn't you," she said carefully.

Elissa's expression became slightly bemused, and she spat like a viper. "That was before your _insolence!_ You need to be taught _respect, _and a lesson in _pain._"

Seheira had almost expected the answer, and tried another angle even as the dread built within her. "We're bargaining chips remember? Cortez needs us alive as hostages in case you need to keep Lara Croft under control."

Elissa sneered and laughed. "_Lara Croft"_ – she spat the name with vile contempt – "is _dead_. I defeated that _pathetic – ugly – bitch!_"

Elissa seemed to be enjoy slowly stalking her prey, and was taking an evil delight in watching Seheira back away from her with fear-filled eyes. In whichever direction Seheira chose to escape, Elissa followed with slow and deliberate steps.

The clinical psychologist inside Seheira caught that word – '_ugly_' – spoken with a little too much passion, a little too much hate, and Seheira carefully thought the revelation over a moment. "Lara was always quite a striking, beautiful woman in my opinion," She said after a moment, choosing an almost conversational tone of voice to cleverly press the point, as if it weren't of any real consequence. Seheira studied Elissa's reaction with interest.

Elissa missed a step, and, nearly hidden inside her mask of pure anger, she subtly flinched as if suddenly bitten by a mosquito. It spoke volumes to Seheira as she watched Elissa quickly bulldoze her vulnerability aside and retreat inside her shell of pure rage. Forde looked on as if Seheira had suddenly gone mad, there were a thousand other things he might say rather than discuss Lara's looks at this moment.

"Who cares what _you_ think!" Elissa hissed. "I am like a _God_ compared to you! And you will bow down before me soon enough!"

If Seheira had thought Elissa slightly mad beforehand, the fact was now fully confirmed in her mind. Elissa was a twisted, mere shade of a human being, all humanity having evaporated no doubt at the wiles and machinations of William Cortez. Seheira knew that madness took many forms, and that the worst cases made the person extremely unpredictable. Only the most skilled clinicians could even hope to offer a modicum of help to such people.

"Let William Cortez decide our fate," Seheira offered purely to buy more time.

"He's even more off the planet than sh– " Forde interjected, but he quit the observation as Seheira quickly raised and waggled a finger at him. _Careful!_

Mercifully, Elissa showed no reaction to Forde's comment. Instead she suddenly launched herself into a charge, with the clear intent to kill. Although Seheira had been watching for exactly that, she was still taken aback at how quickly such a large woman could move, and only spun away with half a second to spare.

Seheira sprinted 10 steps for all she was worth before she dared look around to see what Elissa had done. Seeing that the demonic woman had turned about-face in her wake, she didn't dare stop moving and continued across the room, jumping over several piles of artefacts mid-flight, and scooping up some sort of smallish earthenware jug from the last pile as she sailed over.

The jug went hurling toward her assailant, with fury, before she again sprinted away from Elissa's renewed relentless charge.

Forde watched in horror as the jug shattered across Elissa's hastily raised forearm, the jagged shards sputtering off in all directions like a swarm of frightened bees. Desperately, he racked his brains for something he could do to get free of the two guards who held him. In the end the answer was surprisingly simple. The guards' attention had wavered onto the action being played out in the cavern, so Forde silently counted to ten and steeled himself. He suddenly sprang to his feet in a squatting position, then launched himself upward, driving his shoulder into the groin of the man on his left as he went.

The assault had the desired effect, and the bandit yelled a strangled cry and stumbled away a few steps clutching his gentleman's area. The bandit to his right took valuable seconds to catch up with events, being more interested in the cat and mouse game being played out between Elissa and Seheira. It cost him. Without the clamping effect of both bandits, Forde found he was instantly able to move more freely, as if suddenly escaping a thick pool of syrup. The second bandit hastily tried to shove his rifle barrel into Forde's face, but with his right arm Forde brushed it aside with a pure strength of will, and then rammed a left hook cleanly into the bandits nose less than a second later.

As the man fell away clutching his face, Forde remained on top of him, and unleashed a knee into the Bandit's abdomen expelling the man's breath in a sudden tide of pain, doubling him over. As if on autopilot, Forde reached and yanked the bandit's rifle from his clutching grasp, knowing there were two other guards in the room to deal with, including the brute soldier who'd watched them overnight. He spun from the two reeling men to focus on the others but luck wasn't with him, the brute had been spurred into action and was charging him down like an enraged bull at red flag.

Seheira knew Forde had made a move, and the corner of her mind noted the supersoldier launch himself across the room. But she had problems of her own, and she was fast running out of options as Elissa continued chasing her down with inhuman strength. Anything she could find from amongst the piles of artefacts she hurled at her enemy with every ounce of energy she possessed; wooden carvings, stone sculptures, even a thermos filled with hot coffee or some such like. The objects however, did little more than bounce off the enraged woman or shatter against her battering-ram arms, and did not appear to slow her in the slightest. It was better than nothing though.

Just when it began to appear that that Seheira and Forde had successfully created pandemonium, a troupe of additional bandits jogged through the doorway and into the chamber. Seheira immediately felt a sinking sensation of defeat as she noted the men enter, but vowed not to give up until the proverbial fat lady had exercised her vocal cords.

The additional men were difficult to gauge; they each wore green plastic raincoats slick with wet and had their hoods pulled over their heads. They took only moments to take in the situation inside the chamber and aim their automatic weapons at both Seheira and Forde; that done, the leader of the newcomers fired off a brief volley into the cavern roof to show he meant no holds barred business.

The cracking gunshots echoed throughout the chamber viciously, but Forde only gave up trying to avoid the supersoldier once two men had hurried up to him with weapons raised. He had no choice but to give up, raising his hands upward in defeat. The supersoldier was soon upon him, and wrenched Forde's arms behind his back with brutal roughness held them there with an iron grip. Once again Forde couldn't move. His attempt at freedom had been all too brief, he thought bitterly.

Two men also rushed over with military precision and jammed their gunbarrels angrily at Seheira. She could do nothing but follow Forde's lead and raise her hands toward the cavern roof in frustrated defeat.

There was a moment of silence as the balance of dominace in the room shifted. Elissa was the only person that moved. She raged. She slowly walked up to Seheira and unleashed a heated backhand that sent her sprawling across the cavern floor and crashing heavily against a pile of artefacts.

"Bitch!" the massive woman yelled, fists balled by her side. "You're about to wish you were _fucking dead!_" Elissa stalked purposefully, following up her prey like an evil sorceress. Seheira was clearly groggy from the hammerblow, fumbling drunkenly in her attempt to get up.

"Hey ugly!" Forde yelled suddenly. "You crazy _dogheap bitch_! How about I cut your head off and send it to _fucking Cortez_ in garbage bag!"

The supersoldier twisted Forde's arms harder behind his back in recompense, making Forde grimace and grit his teeth, but his insults were on the mark.

Almost every weapon in the room steadied upon him, save for the two that hovered inches from the still-groggy Seheira's head. Oddly, Forde noted a man with ragged long hair hover in the background shadows by the doorway; he was tricked with two more modern weapons and seemed strangely at odds with the others. Fully covered by a plastic raincoat that the new arrivals had donned however, Forde couldn't discern what had piqued his sudden interest in the man. No time existed to ponder the matter further, as the room had frosted down to a complete and brooding hellish silence, Elissa staring at him with ice-blade eyes.

"You wish to die first Mr Forde?" she asked stonily, forgetting Seheira momentarily and taking a few steps toward him.

Forde had no plan, but he was damned if he'd watch Seheira getting beaten to a pulp by a sadistic maniac. "You think you're valuable to Cortez?" he asked, hoping to stall her. "You're just another pawn to him, a game piece – to be knocked off the board when it suits his purpose. Don't delude yourself, you're nothing to him."

Elissa seethed with explosive hate. "He _loves_ me!" she almost growled in hot riposte. She closed the rest of the distance between them like a predator homing in on a hapless victim, her balled fist raised before her like a battering ram. "_You _are deluded! I can tear out your useless heart with my bare hands you – "

Elissa was halted mid-sentence as she noted an extremely wide grin spread across Forde's face, where there should have been the pure shaking fear of a condemned man. "What in _HELL_ do you have laugh about?" she accused with a hellstorm of disbelief, her fist almost touching Forde's nose.

Then a new voice cut in with clear authority, one that had not spoken inside the cavern until now, and it said "A bulldozer with attitude, how quaint." It came from directly over Elissa's back, and carried dire warning. Forde could see the speaker, but she couldn't.

Elissa lost a shade of colour, because she knew the voice, and knew it to be impossible. She slowly turned, almost not wanting to confirm the identity of the speaker and make it real. A raincoat covered the person; their facial features mostly lost inside the dark of the plastic hood, but there could be no doubting the malachite green eyes that burned within. As she fully rounded, Elissa came face to face with two automatic gunbarrels that never wavered a millimetre, and a penetrating stare that she knew all too well. A glacial chill swept across her.

Elissa's voice cracked, as if she'd seen a ghost. "No… it isn't possible…you… you're dead. I killed you, I… I saw you die."

"Do a sloppy job, get sloppy results," the voice answered, as the speaker pulled back the hood of the raincoat. Dense and lengthy black hair spilled forth as the hood dropped back, fully revealing who the person was.

"Lara Croft!" Elissa hissed. She said the name with such venom that no question remained as to what she thought of the newcomer.

"That's _Lady_ Croft to you," Lara said. "I _am_ a Countess as it happens."

"_How did you survive_?" Elissa fired back hotly, as if interrogating a laughing troublesome prisoner.

Lara smiled pointedly, her features slick, sultry, and smooth as she did so. "You think a cliff like that could kill me? My _my_, how little credit you give."

"We found your – " but again Elissa stopped short, knowing they'd all been had.

"Mangled shirt, yes," Lara finished for her. The loosely fastened raincoat dropped away as Lara shrugged it free, and indicated her bare midriff with her elbow. "The one that should go here perchance?" she asked. Elissa glared. "Funny," Lara continued, "I never thought you'd actually fall for that."

Elissa's voice fell into pure, revulsive blackness. "It appears you have more lives than a Gods-be-damned cat – _Lady Croft._ Tell me, that cliff was miles away, in the middle of nowhere, how did you make it here so quickly?" The initial shock passing, Elissa began to see her nemesis more clearly. Lara was dog tired, bandaged, and bruised to hell, and her clothes were so tattered she might have blended straight in with the homeless dregs of the world. Yet her pantheresque eyes brokered no quarter, and, despite her fatigue, the automatic weapons she held at the hip appeared like featherweights in her hands.

Lara cocked her head slightly aside, as if struck by a sudden thought. "I took a jaunt up the river in a canoe I found lying around the place," she answered. Her eyes tracked Forde as he pretended to stumble a little with his own fatigue, taking a few surreptitious steps closer to her in the process. Lara smiled inwardly, Forde was a smooth operator. Her fingers flexed around the rifle triggers and the corners of her mouth twisted into an ingenious smile. "Then I entered into negotiations with the thugs you have dotted around the forest."

Elissa was intrigued by Lara's confidence. "You don't actually think you're going to walk out of here with my prisoners do you _little_ girl? Look around, you're outnumbered twenty to one."

"Never say never until the Devil is done," Lara replied stonily. "Besides," she added, "the head of the snake controls the beast." She jabbed both gunbarrels Elissa's way to indicate just who the 'snake' might be. Then she said, "These Steyr automatics will fill you half full of lead before you, or any one of your thugs, can do a single thing. So don't go getting it in your head you have as much control around here as you think you do."

Lara said the words, but she knew the boast was thin, as every guard in the room had now turned his gun on _her_. Her odds were rocketing into untenable fast, and she knew it.

"Come come Lara." Elissa laughed with evil delight. "A useless death after such heroics? Oh what a shame… "

"You forget," Lara replied, "I've died before and lived to tell the tale."

Only moments after the words had left her lips, a thick deep-orange smoke began to escape from the crumpled heap of Lara's discarded raincoat down on the floor. The first explorative tendrils remained tentative a few seconds only, before rapidly becoming a jet blast of thick and choking smoke. Everybody in the room seemingly lost their vision all at once. Just as Forde disappeared from view, Lara imprinted the Supersoldier's position in her mind, and drew a bead on him with her right hand Steyr. There was nothing else she could do, it was either that or Forde would never make it.

The Steyr spat twice with deadly accuracy, Lara dared no more in case Forde had thought to move in the intervening seconds. Someone yelled out a bull's roar of pain in response; it didn't sound like Forde, but she just couldn't be sure.

Lara moved fast. The emergency marine flare from Jacob's boat she'd borrowed earlier and stashed in her raincoat pocket wouldn't last long, and Elissa would surely be hunting her down at this very moment. In the blinding pall of orange miasma she quickly stepped to where she knew Forde to be, hoping her gunshots had missed him. Shouts erupted around her, but she couldn't afford to pay them any mind. "Forde!" she called mid-toned into the soup, so as not to be discernable over the growing din.

"Here!" a voice answered, equally cautious from nearby, much to Lara's relief. "What's the play?"

"Seheira?" Lara queried, as Forde's thick frame appeared in front of her, mercifully free of his captor.

"Ten paces left with a tinge of right."

"Grab my shoulder," Lara said, "and deal with anyone we blunder into. Let's hope she's stayed put."

The moment Lara felt Forde's searching hand clamp down onto her shoulder she patted it and moved ten paces left, Forde following her. The shouting rose to a frenzied crescendo around them, a few blind gunshots whipping through the unearthly void as people shot at phantoms in the mist. The room was quickly disintegrating into chaos.

"Seheira?" Lara asked into the blinding smoke. A bandit suddenly back-pedalled straight into Lara's side, causing her to stagger a little in the gloom, but the weight quickly disappeared as Forde did his best impression of another annoyed thug jabbering something in Spanish, roughly shoving the man away, hoping the ruse would hold for the few seconds they needed.

"Seheira?" Lara asked again a little louder.

"Lara?" Seheira's tentative voice came from a few paces away.

"Quickly, come grab my arm."

Seconds ticked by, which seemed to take forever in the growing pandemonim, before Seheira's coughing face appeared through the smoke. Forde immediately stepped forward and grabbed her hand. "Go!" he said to Lara.

Lara moved. She'd kept a mental picture of the room in her head and made for where she dead-reckoned the exit should be.

"Lara!" Elissa's voice boomed through the mire, far closer than Lara had hoped it would be. "This is pointless. You're not getting out of here with a _pathetic_ stunt like that."

"We'll see about that," Lara muttered, so that only Forde and Seheira could hear.

Two men thundered across their path ahead, and Lara tracked them briefly with a Steyr until they'd disappeared again. Fourteen steps later the solid cavern wall appeared, and Lara, taking her best-guess gamble, turned to the right where she thought the cavern's exit would be. She was rewarded when the doorway suddenly appeared before them in the orange gloom.

Once through the door, the orange smoke of the marine flare thinned quickly, and the three fugitives bolted for their lives. The stairs vanished behind them as they ran. Lara ruthlessly cut down a soldier who'd been posted at the outer entrance of The Edifice with a precision that brokered no quarter. They were in a run for their lives and neither Forde nor Seheira questioned the action. Running freely now in a tight threesome, they tore down the outer steps of The Edifice and made for the jungle.

Before they got there however, Elissa's enraged voice rang out from the steps of The Edifice, quickly followed by the unmistakable rapport of automatic gunfire. Lara spun like a fluid ballerina and returned fire with both Steyr automatics, shooting from the hip as she quickly backstepped in Forde and Seheira's wake for the cover of the jungle.

Elissa went down; from a bullet strike or simply in the act of trying to protect herself, Lara couldn't be sure. She had no time to care, and turned to bolt for the cover of the forest. It was still dark, and the faint unearthly glow of the moon was soon lost inside the dense cover of the Amazon rainforest. Forde and Seheira were crouching low, waiting for her.

"Pleasant night for a walk," Forde said.

Lara shoved one of the Steyrs into his grasp. "Indeed," she said, quickly whipping her head around in a storm of long hair to check their tails. "We have to move," she added, as she removed her pistol from her tattered shorts and held it out for Seheira to take. Lara then turned back to face her friend of long ago, and her hardened eyes softened for the briefest moment. "Hello Seheira," she said. "Are you hurt?"

Seheira, taking the offered weapon, almost seemed amused and a quirky smile spread across her face, albeit undershot with her own thumping adrenalin. "A few bruises and aches," she said. "But nothing that's going to stop _this_ girl from reaching a hot spa and a decent hotel room."

Lara nodded, and then became the hardened soldier once more. "Follow me," she then said to them both. We're going to need to run for it.

They ran, seemingly at random into the tangled black of the deep-night forest, until Lara reached down into the undergrowth and pulled out a faintly glowing lightstick. Her tactic became clear when a few moments further on she again reached down and scooped another light stick from the forest floor. She'd laid a trail beforehand, leading off to somewhere only she knew. Clever, Seheira thought, admiring her. Shouts and torchbeams began cutting through the forest in their wake, telling them that Elissa and her gaggle of thugs were hot on their heels.

Lara hoped like the devil that her hastily concocted plan would come off. She knew it had been a minor miracle that none of them had copped a stray bullet or been too injured to escape. Forde and Seheira both limped, though neither complained, and it was painfully clear to Lara that both had been on the receiving end of some extremely rough treatment. Added to that, judging by her attire, it seemed as if Seheira had been chased out of bed in the dead of night, and then hadn't stopped running for days.

Searching gunshots cracked through the night in the forest behind them, but Lara ran onward, taking care not to get too far ahead of her friends. They hit a thin forest trail and Lara cut to the right and sprinted. They ran in silence for no more than a few minutes before the trail suddenly stopped at a small wooden jetty that jutted out into a small waterway. It might have been a dead-end, but tied to the end of the jetty was one of the 32-foot PBR's that had buzzed past Lara on the river earlier the day before. It was how she'd gotten to Stan and Seheira so quickly from the airfield. There were also several camouflaged jetski's tied to the various pylons along the length of the jetty. Lara halted, her chest heaving only a little, and her still-painted face appearing ghostly in the soft glow of the moon.

"Feel like a midnight cruise?" she said as Forde and Seheira reached her.

Seheira's long blonde hair had gone slightly wild, making her appear like an Amazon Queen of storybook legend. "You romantic softie Lara," she said with a grin. "Where do I sign up?"

Forde showed clear signs of fatigue as he stopped and bent over doubled, as internal pains wreaked havoc though his body. Lara could tell that he hadn't had an easy time of it. But he gritted his teeth and saluted, "Aye aye, Cap'n. It's the buccaneer life for me. This place stinks anyhow."

Grins of humour at Forde's staunch resolve flashed across both girls' faces, before Lara said, "Then go crank that PBR in the guts," She hiked a thumb over her shoulder to indicate the riverboat.

"What about the jetski's?" Seheria asked, peering down at them as Forde hurried off to the PBR. "They'll come after us right?"

Lara was pensive. "Damn straight," she said nodding, making her long tresses fall across her face. "We made them hate us a whole lot just now."

Seheira thought a few moments, and then turned to rush up the jetty. "I'm frakking untying them then and shoving them out in the damn river."

But before she could go Lara suddenly said, "Seheira."

Seheira stopped and turned back, and was taken aback by the expression of guilt Lara had on her face. "Wha –" she began but stopped short. "Lara what is it?"

Lara seemed stuck for words, then tried to say something, and then got stuck for words again. Eventually she just blurted, "Oh god damn it Seheira," and suddenly threw her arms out to hug her friend. "I'm sorry you got caught up in this mess."

Seheira returned the embrace, finding comfort in the close heart-felt human contact. Her voice cracked a little with emotion, "It's good to see you again Lara. You disappeared there for a while." Then she added, "And besides, this beats lecturing to a theatre full of bored students any day."

Their brief moment was interrupted by the cranking of the PBR's twin Detroit Diesel engines. "Do your stuff," Lara said as the engines caught and roared to life. "I'll make sure nobody pops out of the jungle until we're out of here."

Seheira released Lara, then held her at arms length a moment and said, "Don't do anything rash Lara, you _are _mortal you know," then hurriedly turned and ran down the jetty to untie the tethered jetski's.

Over the roar of the PBR's engines it was impossible for Lara to hear if any enemy voices approached. She noted that Forde had cranked the PBR's engines in the dark, obliviously knowing that the boat's lights would do no more than paint a massive target on each of their backs in the near pitch-dark of the night. A clever tactic she had to admit. Forde seemed to be keeping his head despite the pressured situation.

The horizon lay out of view by the towering trees that lined the river and stretched off into eternity, but Lara knew that dawn couldn't be far away. The cover of dark would be near essential if the next phase of her plan was going to come off, but either way, she thought, there was no turning back now. Suddenly a torchlight shone up the trail, and Lara knew they'd been made.

Another thought struck her, and instead of shooting off at the light with her Steyr, she bolted for the PBR. "Incoming!" she yelled as she bolted up the jetty. "Seheira! Move your ass!" She vaulted over the side of the PBR and moved like the wind to the bow of the boat, and the twin .50 calibre M2 machine guns mounted there in a rotating tub. The 'tub' was basically like a barrel built down into the hull of the boat with a seat in it. Once seated, only Lara's head peeped over the side through metal weldmesh crosshairs. She took the grips of the M2's in each hand and rotated toward the approaching torchlight, racing toward them on the trail. Forde, visible to her in the PBR's driver's chair, was only a few feet away. "Forde!" Lara yelled, turning her head slightly back toward him. "We need to go! Get Seheira on board now!"

"On it!" Forde yelled back in total agreeance.

Seheira hadn't had enough time to shove all the jetski's into the river, but heard Lara's strained plea and abandoned her task. The rapid thunder claps of the twin M2's opened up and made a hellfire racket as she gave a final boot-shove to the jetski she currently worked on. Seeing it float free she clambered back onto the jetty and bolted for the PBR amid the fire-orange barrel flashes of the guns. Return fire popped from the shore in retaliation as she hurdle-jumped onto the deck of the PBR, much to Forde's relief.

The second Seheira's feet hit the deck, Forde roared "Hang on to you hats!" and threw the PBR's throttles forward. Only then did he hit the switch to the boat's powerful array of spotlights, suddenly lighting the river ahead into stark brilliance. Lara continued to pepper the shoreline with the M2's as they took off, but noted uneasily the unmistakeable bulk of Elissa bursting out onto the jetty spewing forth a tirade of automatic gunfire. Obviously, the brute of a woman had survived Lara's earlier attack.

Forde and Seheira immediately crouched as low as possible to avoid the pinging hits of Elissa's hasty shots. The jetty however, quickly became dark as Forde jammed the throttles to their stops and gained precious distance from the jetty, taking them out of range of Elissa's automatic.

Forde split the middle of the river as best he could, fully aware that the waterways of the Amazon were rarely tangle free. He could only hope that Cortez' thugs had cleared the river for their own use. After he was sure they'd made good distance, he eased back on the throttles to a more workable night-running speed. He quickly turned to Seheira. "You ok Seheira?" he asked her.

Seheira gripped the backrest of the passenger seat beside Forde with grim determination. "Yes," she said with a staunch but suffering nod to him. "I'm tired of being shot at though."

"You and me both," Forde agreed with a nod of understanding.

Lara appeared beside them, having climbed out of the M2 tub and jumped back onto the deck. She also looked deathly tired, but her determination was plain to see. She was clearly relieved to see both her shipmates whole after the close call. "That was too close for comfort," she said to them both.

Forde nodded. "You can say that again, my underthings have sure copped a beating tonight." Then he grinned. "Nice M2 work there though Lara. Something tells me you've done that before. Don't tell me you've got a setup like that at home?"

Lara slung her Steyr over her shoulder, folded her arms, and gave them both a secretively amused expression. "Well how do you deal with unwanted salesmen?" she countered.

"Bad language usually," Forde replied. "I have quite a repertoire these days."

"Surely not," Seheira said. "I thought you were a gentleman?"

Forde threw the PBR into an easy turn as the river snaked left, then turned to face her a moment. "Every gentleman has a dose of bad boy inside," he said, looking into her aquamarine eyes. "You just wait till you meet _that_ guy."

" Will he take me to dinner if we ever get out of this mess?" she asked.

"Only the finest," Forde grinned. "There's this little restaurant on the banks of the river in Oxford. We get out of here, and the reservation is as good as made."

Lara looked from Forde to Seheira, and saw the feeling in both their eyes. Even in such a place, she thought, and in such circumstances, love could bloom. "Sooooo," she said with amusement. "Back to business then."

Seheira nodded and looked slightly abashed. "What's the plan oh-captain-my-captain?" she asked.

Lara took a heavy breath, and reached out to tame her hair as it flew in the briskish Amazon wind. "Where's a hair elastic when you need one," she said offhandedly, looking around with dark, good-natured humour.

Seheira smiled a little more girlishly than she'd intended. "Tell me about it," she agreed. "My hair's been untamed since I got boosted from my townhouse."

"Ahem," Forde said with roguish forbearance. "There was talk of a plan?"

Lara looked at him as though she studied a quirkish sculpture in a street mall. "Simple really," she replied, knowing that what she was about to say would be a hard sell. "Cortez' airfield is up the river a little way. We park this tub close by, sneak in and borrow a plane. Then we simply enjoy the flight back to England."

Silence reigned a few moments, where only the noise of the PBR's revving diesels could be heard. "That won't be easy," Forde eventually said, looking quietly pensive. "Cortez has a whole army of thugs around that airfield."

"We have no other choice," Lara relpied. "This is about as remote as you can get in the Amazon, and once this boat is out of fuel we're helpless. We've got no supplies, we're all shot to pieces, and I'm tired of running around with no clothes on."

"Well… When you put it like that," Forde agreed.

Seheira suddenly noticed Lara's painfully brief clothing for the first time. "Jesus Lara!" She exclaimed. "You must be freezing."

Lara gave a short laugh. "I would be," she said. "But I got numb hours ago."

"Cool outfit at least," Seheira, said, trying to make her feel better.

Lara rolled her eyes. "Oh for a jumper," she lamented.

Forde, looking back, noted a light on the river behind them. "Playtime's over," he announced. "Company on out tail!"

Seheira looked back at Forde's warning. "God damn it! Can't they leave us alone?"

"Bad guys will be bad guys," Lara said with a tired outrushing breath. She unslung her Steyr and checked the loaded clip.

"So all we have to do is make the airfield without getting shot," Seheira summed, "and then sneak past Cortez' army of thugs and steal a plane from under their noses. Then we actually have to get the plane in the air without getting shot and make it back to England without getting shot out of the sky. Talk about tall order!"

"Oh I don't know," Lara replied, as the buzz of a jetski became discernable over roar of the Diesels. Her pantheresue expression filled her features. "It's worth a shot in the dark."

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	22. A Shot in the Dark

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**Well it's been a long time. A long time indeed. It was November 2009 when I started this story, and so much has changed for me since then. As echoed by another writer here I have a lot of respect for, EmDiSea, I am a very different person now to the one that started this story all that time ago. Those times seem like another life to me now, lived by someone else. I haven't updated because, well, things have been tough for me in many respects. Yet, here I am. This chapter has been slowly written since I posted the last update, and has undergone many changes in that time.**

**I'm now looking at how the story will finish, and trying to roadmap the way to the end. I set this story up to be a sweeping epic, and in many respects there's still a lot that is undeveloped. So trying to finish it quickly just won't work. All this build up and then to just slam the story closed would result in a very weird and unsatisfying experience. So I'm trying to set out a sequence that will work, and won't take ages. **

**The truth is I just don't know if I can finish this. I take immense pleasure in writing so I honestly hope I can. I give heartfelt thanks to all those who've offered encouragement along the way. Your comments really do drive me onward. OveractiveImaginer - if you're still out there I offer particular thanks to you. You read and commented on every chapter I wrote. The Iron Paw salutes you. **

**So here we are, rolling onto chapter 15. Power to you guys.**

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***15***

**A Shot in the Dark  
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**The dawn hid somewhere** just past the hidden horizon, but for the moment, the thin crescent moon held sway upon the heavens amid a gathering swarm of dark clouds. The wind on the river was spirited as it rushed through Lara's hair, causing it to spill out behind her like a series of long streamers taking flight on a flagpole. Black shadows lay through the thick and billowing trees that overhung each edge of the river, only standing aside briefly as the fleeing PBR shot past with a sudden kicked-up line of spray. Flowing with a serene and looping carelessness, the river seemed as if it were ages old, the waters having travelled from the dawn of time itself. Swirling currents, whirlpools, and sentient-like upwellings were clearly evident under the powerful beams of the old riverboat's spotlights, making the water appear as if it were alive.

Lara stood gripping both 'spade handles' of the rear, tripod-mounted M2 .50 calibre Browning heavy machine gun, attempting to gain a feel for the weapon as it moved in accordance with the jolting hull of the PBR at full throttle. A clean and steady aim was almost impossible, and she suddenly wished a Vietnam Veteran were at hand to lend her some much-needed pointers with the weapon. With her thumbs planted firmly on the weapon's butterfly trigger, and her eyes pinned through the old iron sights, she was as ready as she was ever going to be. Lara remembered reading that M2's had been around since the 1930's, but that certainly didn't mean they were outdated, she thought, with many modern day armies still using the old stalwarts of war in current operations. From the look of it, this particular gun had suffered a hard life, but was well oiled, and the loaded ammunition belt was almost certainly brand new.

Seheira, showing a businesslike fortitude that raised Lara's left eyebrow a touch, hefted another ammunition box over to the M2 Tripod and clanged it down in a purpose-designed rack with a heavy thump. "Heavy little so-and-so's," she said to Lara as she peered rearward, and toward the chasing lights of the jetski's. "You think we have a chance of keeping them off?"

Lara gave a slight grin, and glanced briefly across at her friend of old. "See these silver tips on the cartridges?" She asked, reaching forward to touch a shell on the ammunition belt that fed into the gun's breech. Seheira nodded, intrigued. "Armour piercing rounds," Lara explained. "Those thugs back there should stay well away if they knew what was good for them."

"Ahhh well, we're just stupid English girls who only think about polishing our fingernails, and where our next massage will come from." Seheira said wryly. "No doubt they'll think we're just staring dumbly at these guns wondering what the heck they are."

"Clotheslines would be my guess," Lara replied with a deep and grinning sarcasm, as she returned her gaze to the view through M2's iron sights.

"That's what I thought," Seheira agreed. "Funny how a 'clothesline' can suddenly become a girl's best fiend." Then her smile vanished. "Lara – if we don't get through this…"

The boat suddenly jolted as Forde spun the wheel with aggression. "Christ!" he yelled. "Incoming! Get the _hell_ down!"

The two girls instantly looked forward to where Forde stood hunched down at the wheel, and immediately saw the ungodly sight of a second PBR's spotlights bearing down on them through the windshield. They then heard the unmistakeable rapport of thunder as the forward Twin M2's on the boat began unleashing Hell upon them.

Lara and Seheira dropped to the deck with a shade of a second to spare. The same .50 calibre slugs that Lara had spoken of moments earlier now tore through fibreglass the hull of their own boat, shattering the windshield, and sending a storm of debris flying into the night like a swarm of enraged bats, as the hail of gunfire strafed them broadside.

Forde limited their exposure with another sharp turn, moving them mostly out of harm's way, but the vicious pockmarks rocketing across the water left no doubt that the gunners on the other boat wanted their blood. The rear deck gunner continued to pepper them as the enemy boat sped past, and Forde could do no more than steer erratically in an attempt to avoid the deadly bullet stream spewing toward them. To add to their predicament, a sudden loud bang from beneath the waterline instantly told Forde he'd hit something submerged in the water, only a matter of time before that happened, he thought grimly. He could only hope the damage wouldn't be anything serious.

The whole boat jolted violently with the hit, and the three fugitives shared a brief glance of consternation. Forde twisted the boat toward the treeline, and then eased it around one of the many bends in the river, temporarily breaking the line of sight between them and the other PBR. He looked back at the two girls, who were covered in small shards of fibreglass, but thankfully otherwise unhurt. "They'll be back," He yelled over the screaming of the engines and the roaring wind that filled his ears.

Lara stood, and threw a dire glance back Forde's way. "Let them come," She yelled with pantheresque menace. "Get ready!"

Forde nodded, and propped his Steyr automatic across the boat's dashboard. So far all the gauges had remained in the green, though the revolution counters for both engines hovered near the red zone. The boat was giving all she had.

Lara looked across at Seheira. "If there _is_ a shadow of a chance we'll get through this," she said, referring to Seheira's earlier comment, "then we're going to need everything we've got."

"The guns at the front?" Seheira replied, catching Lara's drift.

"You hold the handles just like this," – Lara showed her, placing her own hands on the M2 she stood at – "and it will have the same butterfly trigger as this one." She tapped the M2's trigger with her thumbs. "Just shoot and don't think about it. It's them or us." She gave Seheira an encouraging look. "Can you do it?"

Seheira nodded with determination, "You just watch me," she said, showing a dighting spirit, and quickly ran forward to climb around onto the bow of the boat.

Lara knew she was asking a lot of her friend. To be lecturing at Oxford one day, and then involved in a gun battle for your life the next, would crack most people over the edge into insanity, but with the arrival of the second enemy patrol boat their situation had become far more tenuous, their odds of survival dropping away by the second. She could only hope that Seheira would hold it together, they needed her.

Forde had hoped the river would continue to twist and turn so he could continue to break the line of sight with their attackers, but it wasn't to be. They shot into a long straight that showed no sign of ending within the powerful beams of the spotlights, the river stretching off into the dark like a glistening highway. Noting Seheira settle into the forward tub, he stole a glance backward and saw that they wouldn't have long to wait.

All too soon, the buzzing lights of two jetski's popped around the bend behind them and immediately settled into their wake. Lara saw them too, and breathed deeply to clear her mind. The M2 became part of her, the crosshairs of the weapon melding with her own crystalline mind. She counted slowly to ten, allowing the faster jetski's to close some of the distance between them, and then set the butterfly trigger to work.

The gun roared with hellish fury, its bullet-machine sound cracking across all other noise. Lara's tense arms jolted rapidly as she unleashed a sustained burst. In the glare of the oncoming lights, she couldn't be sure of exactly where her aim was taking the bullets, so she altered her aim ever so slightly with each passing second to cover all bases.

One of the lights suddenly shot skyward in a dramatic fast-spinning roll of destruction. Lara couldn't know it in the darkness, but her aim had disintegrated the forward section of one jetski, causing it to suddenly dig into the water and then fly upward into the air to bleed off its remaining momentum. Realising the fugitives had teeth; the driver of the second jetski immediately hung a wide turn out into the middle of the river to try a different approach.

Lara's subconscious registered the fireworks but her piercing expression never changed, and she immediately switched to tracking the second jetski's breakaway move. Putting a slight lead on the target through the murky gloom, she again mashed the butterfly trigger, but the M2 had only fired briefly before their PBR again hit something submerged in the water, violently wrenching the boat off course amid a thunderclap boom, and throwing Lara's aim wild.

Forde cursed, stumbled, and grappled with the wheel, there was simply no way of seeing anything submerged in the tannin-stained water amid the dark until they were almost upon it. All he could do was pray that the PBR's hull could withstand the shellacking it was getting. Even as he prayed to God it could, a light on the dash suddenly lit, indicating a build up of water in the bilge. So much for praying, he thought grimly, all he could do was hit the bilge pumps and rely on hope alone.

The collision had wrenched them clear of the treeline and sent them speeding out into the river toward the jetski. Automatic gunfire flashes appeared from the smaller craft as the two vessels rapidly came within close broadside contact, causing near enough point blank shooting from both sides. Ruthlessly disregarding the danger, Lara recovered her aim and returned fire with her far more powerful weapon. The Jetski never stood a chance, and flew apart into a thousand pieces under the sustained heavy-hitting onslaught, the rider doing a kamikaze jump into the air as his ride ceased to exist. Long seconds later, he crash-tackled the surface of the river with a spectacular bone-breaking splash. Two down, Lara thought, but only God knew how many remained.

Almost the instant the idea formed that the current danger had passed, Lara suddenly heard the M2's up at the front of the boat come to life. For the umpteenth time that night, Forde spun the wheel in an evasive manoeuvre and cursed a slurry of curses that would have made hardened criminals blush in their coveralls.

"Double bogeys at twelve o'clock!" he yelled back over his shoulder so Lara would hear.

"More jetski's?" she yelled back.

"Riverboats!" came Forde's strained but simple answer.

All too soon Lara saw the onrushing lights of two additional PBR's, with guns blazing. Seheira was furiously unleashing hell the on the boat coming up on the left of them. Seeing that the second boat would pass to the right, Lara spun her M2 to Starboard to meet it head-on, and tensed. Things could hardly get any damn worse she seethed inwardly. It was a classic straddling tactic, being used to split their defences too thinly, and Lara knew their odds of survival had just become long in the extreme. The simple war-of-attrition tactics would inevitably wear them down to nothing.

Forde instantly crouched behind the console as a hot hailstorm withered the canopy and upperworks of the boat around him. Lara crouched as low as she could behind the tripod mounting of her M2, but the cover it offered suddenly seemed painfully nonexistent amid the barrage. Only Seheira felt a modicum of safety sequestered down in the barrel of her M2 emplacement as she was.

Remembering the tactics of World War two spitfire pilots, Forde set the PBR into a slight curving turn, so as not to present the ease of a consistently moving target along a simple trajectory. It wasn't a lot, he thought, but it was better than doing nothing.

The boats roared past with a tirade of screaming turbo diesel engines and the death shattering thunderclaps of M2's at full tilt. Lara took a bead on the boat she tracked through the iron sights that filled her vision, a thin smile appearing as the spotlights on the boat suddenly went dark amid a shower of sparks. Bullet slugs came back at them, and peppered their own hull, the deck, and all around Lara's tripod, but she remained stubbornly single minded. The corner of her mind noted Seheira's M2 fall silent as she lost her angle on the boat she was tracking as it sped astern. Lara only silenced her weapon as the enemy PBR's quickly gained too much distance for her gunfire to be effective.

Their patrol boat had taken a battering, and now looked more like an ancient hulk that had been rotting in the damp rainforest for decades. The engines still screamed at full tilt however, seemingly unharmed, but Lara knew they were pushing their luck extremely thin. Seeing the two PBR's wheel around behind them in the faint light of the moon, Lara quickly left the M2 and strode up to Forde.

"Still alive?" she queried, reaching his side.

"I'm not the hell sure if I've been shot or not," Forde said with wry, tense humour. "But for the moment I don't think I'm dead."

Lara noted the Swiss-cheese dashboard array; most of the dials and gauges had been smashed. "The boat?" she asked, eyes narrowing as she took in the damage.

"We've sprung a leak and the bilges are filling up," Forde answered plainly. He tapped one of the smashed gauges. "Beyond that, your guess is as good as mine."

Lara raked flying hair from across her face and made a quick study of the river. She'd come this way earlier, but everything appeared different now that she was coming from the opposite direction. The dark of the night wasn't helping a whole lot either. Nevertheless she formed a dead reckoning of where they were. "The airfield jetty can't be far away," she said through the blustering wind. "Hopefully we can make it there before anyone else tries to shoot at us."

Forde and Lara both turned to look behind them. The PBR that had buzzed them first had now caught up with the two others, boosting the pursuit team up to three.

"Christ we're popular tonight," Forde said with a growl.

"Third boat is running fast," Lara said in calm assessment. "They're gaining on us."

"Throttles are at their stops," Forde replied, thumping at both with the heel of his palm to make sure. "Looks like we're booked in for another gun battle whether we like it or not."

The boat rolled to port slightly as Forde negotiated a turn. Something rolled across the debris-strewn deck.

"Maybe," Lara said as the loose object took form in the moonlight. She stepped over to it, and, hefting the thing into her arms, she held it up so Forde could see. "And maybe not," she said then with her wraithlike grin.

Forde could see that Lara held a rusted, but reasonable-sized propane gas tank that seemed older than the boat itself. He grinned also, catching her drift. "Any gas in that thing?" he queried.

Lara jangled the tank around a moment. "Enough for our purposes," she replied with a glint in her eye. "We need to get dead ahead of them, on a straight," – she jangled the tank again, testing its weight – "think you can do it?"

"Does the Pope have a balcony?" Forde quipped with a calculating sparkle in his eye.

"You bet your flaming derriere he does," Lara said, grinning. She then quickly stepped beside Forde and craned her neck through the shattered windscreen to check on Seheira. "You hit anything with that?" she yelled though the boxing wind.

Seheira's flying blonde tresses rose up from the tub, around her neck was a pair of military issue earmuffs that appeared extremely battered and well used, obviously having been secreted on the M2 someplace. She gave Lara the thumbs up, but looked slightly shaken. "I'll keep my day job if you don't mind," she yelled back, then nodded toward the gun. "This thing is a demon!"

"Damn straight!" Lara replied, nodding back to her in encouragement. Then she said, "There might be a loud bang."

"You don't say!"

"I meant I'm going to make one," Lara explained.

"You don't say!" Seheira repeated with a wry smile.

Lara grinned and gave her shipmate a salute, which was returned by Seheira, then rushed to the back of the boat to put her idea in play. The plan was simple. Lob the old propane gas tank into the water and let the pursuing PBR's and Jetski's come up to it, then, shoot it into a fireball. Hopefully, Lara thought to herself, the resulting boom might decommission a few vital parts and leave the thugs behind them dead in the water, or put them off their game at least. "Say when!" she yelled back to Forde.

"Oh I'll say when alright," Forde muttered to himself, more to bolster his own courage than anything else. He feathered the PBR into the middle of the river, glad to be away from the tree-lined edge and the collection of submerged hazards they'd found there. Minutes passed as they negotiated turns and travelled through chicanes that would almost certainly spoil their plan, but eventually the river opened out into another straight.

"Do it!" Forde yelled, flipping the switch for the rear-facing spotlights at the same time. One spotlight struggled to life, buzzing in clear death throes, the others having been scattered to the wind in a thousand pieces earlier.

Lara lobbed the propane tank into the water with an audible splosh, and, tracking the spot with her eyes, she lithely took up her position behind her M2 once again. The spotlight crackled and popped above her, its light wavering as a result, but it was enough for Lara to see the smooth lines of the propane tank bob to the surface amid the white churning of their wake. Forde cut their speed so the distances wouldn't become too great. The events that followed played out erratically at best.

Lara shot early, knowing she'd have to modify her aim by reading the bullet impact geysers in the water, not an easy task at night and at distance. Gunshot flashes appeared from the boats behind them, the thugs obviously thinking that Lara was taking a shot at _them._

Seconds ticked over, and Lara cursed as the boats in chase arrived at the spot where she thought the propane tank should be, and was just about to call the operation a misfire when a massive fireball suddenly erupted over the water, closely followed by an angry bass-laden boom.

Forde whooped as one of the PBR's immediately reacted by swerving away from the explosion in a panic, and collided broadside with the boat beside them. The darkness hid most of the detail, but spotlights danced wildly in the distance and several screams and yells could be made out amid the sudden confusion. Additional thumps and booms rang out, which could only be the jetski's hitting the suddenly re-oriented boats. Lara fed a lengthy stream of gunfire into the mix to add extra bite to the maelstrom she had created. She took no pleasure in it, simply remaining fixed on what was necessary to keep them alive.

No sooner had this happened, than Seheira spied a jetty reaching out into the river through the crosshairs of her M2. It was alive with activity. It seemed they were expected. "_Shit!"_ she cursed silently. There was no time to warn the others, all she could do was shoot back at the muzzle flashes already greeting them.

Forde turned at the sounds of Seheira's M2. "For God's sake!" he groaned as he too spied the jetty alive with shooting thugs. He whipped his head aside "LARA!"

"Shit!" Lara also cursed as she turned upon Forde's warning, and saw the same.

As the jetty came into view past Forde's wheelhouse, Lara too let fly.

With enemy boats not far behind, and a jetty ahead swarming with gun toting thugs, there was only the briefest instant to ponder just what in the Goddamn hell they could do. Lara was busy; Seheira was busy, so Forde knew it was his call as to what their next course of action would be. To him, it was either speed past the jetty as best they could, and then try to somehow deal with their pursuit team afterward, and then perhaps double back. Or, he thought, they could try something unexpected. The jetty, he noted with mischievousness, didn't seem all that substantial.

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**M**uffai strode the boards of the jetty checking the readiness of the men, but looked up when a sudden explosion sounded from upriver through the first misty hints of dawn. Perhaps their quarry was already floating dead in the river, he thought. He raised a meaty hand to his chin in doubt over the thought however; Lara Croft was proving to be a pain in the backside. Elissa had radioed ahead and told him of the prisoners' escape, and he could hear the utter rage in her voice. There was no doubting their fate should she ever catch up with them, in this life or the next.

A light popped out from the deep shadow that hung down close to the waterline, and Muffai knew it could only be their quarry. Just what Lara's plan could possibly have been, he had to admit he couldn't decipher. Was she going to take another boat and head for the coast? Steal a car and try to drive out? No roads came in or out of Cortez' airfield, so that plan would be a bust from the start. Whatever she had in mind, she was about to become very disappointed.

"Load em up!" he yelled to the men sequestered behind empty drums, freight palettes, and any other oddment they had quickly dragged into place within a moments notice. "No shooting until I give the word!"

Rifles got checked, and spare clips were stashed close to hand for a sustained onslaught. They heard the whistle of the straining turbo's first, the boat itself still lost somewhere behind the oncoming light. Muffai let a minute tick over with easy indifference; the Croft woman and the bothersome prisoners would all be better off visiting the halls of their maker. Good riddance as far as he was concerned.

"Light em up!" he yelled suddenly with gusto, as soon as he thought a few slugs could hit home.

An orchestra of Steyr fire then erupted, as if a gaggle of military drums had suddenly rolled into a firefight. Muffai stood at the very end of the jetty in defiance; he raised his own weapon to his shoulder and pulled the trigger. Lara and her friends would have no choice but to back down, he thought. That was if they didn't get killed in the process of convincing him to stop shooting.

Before long the men were changing out clips and throwing extra ammo bags to each other with well-oiled precision. Muffai frowned a moment when the expected number of pursuit craft failed to appear in chase behind the fugitives, as Elissa's report had clearly listed several armed PBR's and jetski's en-route to intercept, but he couldn't see those at all. His eye's narrowed on Lara's screaming boat as it became discernable in the misty pre-dawn, speeding over the water toward them like a bat straight from hell. Although a veteran, he couldn't help the slight chill that shivered down his spine when the forward M2 on the boat began to spit fire toward them, followed moments later by the one at the rear. He'd expected the fools might try shooting back, but surely, he reasoned, they could see their situation was hopeless. Surely.

The men didn't need to be told, but he yelled, "Take cover!" in any case. Muffai didn't move an inch however; he'd go to Hell before he'd give Gods-be-damned Lara Croft the satisfaction. He slammed another clip into his Steyr with a vehement growl, mashed the trigger, and stared the boat down with eyes of fury.

Muffai had never been superstitious in his life, never once. To him, life was simple, you kept what you killed and you made your own fate. The men on the jetty continued to pound the fugitive boat with all they had, but as it closed the distance there wasn't a single sign of indecisiveness or backdown at all. Frowning slightly, Muffai began to sense something, like his quarry had a plan, like they were in no hurry to lay down and die, but God only knew what they could hope to achieve at this point. As he watched, he inexplicably went cold, his chill creeping deeper.

The next few moments seemed impossible, one moment the boat had been a way out in the river, but the next, it was one hell of a lot closer than it should have been, and in that moment Muffai saw their desperate plan, and he bitterly admitted that he'd never have guessed it in a thousand years. He suddenly ripped the gun from his shoulder in wide-eyed disbelief and cursed damnedly as the full realisation of what the fools were about to do hit home, and then he leapt for his life into the river. But the last thing he saw before hitting the cold water was the madman at the wheel throw him a grinning wave.

Muffai hit the water a seething mass of thwarted hate and overboiling fury. Who the bejeezuz-hell would ram a jetty full of soldiers armed to the teeth and in the process of unloading every weapon they had against them? Goddamn Lara and her shit-meddling friends must have inhaled happy weed or something stronger he concluded, as he surfaced spitting out a mouthful of water, and then scanned around to take stock.

The jetty was a broken mess, now just a splintered jumble of mishmash pylons and rough-cut boards. To a man, every soldier he'd bought with him was now in the same predicament he was, save those who were floating motionless atop the water; they were more than likely dead or in the process of getting there. Muffai yelled in heated frustration and quickly searched the river for the fleeing boat, but stopped short, mouth falling involuntarily agape. He saw that Lara's boat had bulldozed itself up high and dry onto a small section of beach a short distance away, and was belching a thick stack of black smoke from the rear. He grinned like a hyena.

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